


The Big Country

by shulamithbond



Series: Reality X [1]
Category: A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984), Ghost Rider (2007), IT - Stephen King, Misery - Stephen King, Salem's Lot - Stephen King, Sleepaway Camp (1983), Star Wars - All Media Types, Twilight Series - All Media Types
Genre: (I don't know if Freddy and Penny will actually get together or if it's just an AU thing), Autism, BDSM, Barely Legal, Body Horror, Chronic Illness, Existential Crisis, F/F, F/M, Fatherhood, Gen, Interspecies tension, Maybe just to see if I could, Mental Health Issues, No I don't know why I added Twilight to this mix, Other, Queer Themes, Terrorism, Transmisogyny
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-09-13
Updated: 2017-03-24
Packaged: 2018-08-14 20:13:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 36,405
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8027479
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shulamithbond/pseuds/shulamithbond
Summary: Princess Aoife Palpatine's family sends her to Maine's favorite pocket reality to keep her safe, but *danger and intrigue* follow her!(Aoife's first year in Reality X.)





	1. Chapter 1

           “Oh come on, you’re _seriously_ telling me you _can’t_ do it? _At all?_ Come _on,_ Annie! Who cares if you’re late getting her? So let the brat wait!” Frederick Charles Krueger (1942-1977) raged into the phone.

           The voice on the other end of the line, belonging to Anne Marie Wilkes (1943-1987), stayed maddeningly level. “Tim Johnson down in Derry is having those spasm-panic-attack-things again, and Hannibal and I might need to be there overnight this time.”

           “They don’t _fu_ – they don’t _want_ you there at night. If they saw you both lying dead in the _go_ – in the _damn_ street they wouldn’t even spit on your” –

         “Don’t swear at me, please,” said Annie stonily. “That isn’t the point. Fred, I need you to do this.”

         “Why the f – why can’t Lester Sinclair or somebody do it?”

          “His truck isn’t accessible for someone with mobility issues. It’s too high. Besides, it stinks, and she has autism.”

           The mention of autism reminded Freddy. “Why not Arianrod? Or the McAshtons?”

           “ _Their van is in the shop_.” Annie sounded like her temper was running thin. _Well,_ Freddy thought, _so’s mine_. “That’s the whole reason I had stepped in to _begin_ with, Freddy!”

          _“I’ll come, Dad!”_ Crys called distantly; from somewhere behind Annie, it sounded like. The kitchen table, maybe. Maybe she was drawing. _“Hey_ _Mom, tell him I’ll ride up with him!_ ”

          “I heard her,” Freddy headed Annie off. And then, because he’d found about ten bucks in change while they had him sweeping out the lockers for the high school reopening, he said, “I’ll pick her up in a couple hours. We’ll eat at Sven’s on the drive up.”

          He hung up then, because it was as long as he could hold back from yelling and cursing Annie out.

 

* * *

 

           Now, he watched Crysilda Amanda Wilkes-Krueger doodle on the paper placemat with a borrowed pen that Sven had given her automatically when they’d come in. Her past sketches were tacked up behind the register. He kept trying to think whether she looked more like a young Annie, or like him before the fire. She had shoulder-length brown hair, but he’d always thought it looked a little reddish too, and she had freckles that had been more pronounced when she was little. She did have Annie’s nose for sure, but that was okay with Freddy, since he’d always thought his looked kind of hooked and beaky.

           “One more year,” Freddy said absent-mindedly, as if he didn’t remember. “Where you think you’re gonna apply?”

           Crys shrugged, not looking up at him. “A bunch of places, to be safe. That’s what they say you have to do at school. But I’ll probably try for that SUNY school in New Paltz, down in New York state, you know? It has a really good arts and humanities program, and it’s not too far away. But still in another state, so they’ll probably give me more money. Also, the town around it is really cute.” She grinned, probably in memory of the visit.

           Freddy frowned. “That’s a state place, right?”

           “Yeah. So what?”

           “What about that place you said you were gonna visit with your Mom?” Freddy pressed. “That’s in another state, too. And it’s all-girl, right?” He raised an eyebrow-ridge significantly, and grinned right back at her. “Considering…you know…what you told me, an all-girl college sounds like it could be a lot of fun for you, right?”

           Crys shook her head. “I don’t need to go to a private college, Dad.”

           “Why not?” _You’re Freddy’s kid. You’re getting a fancy private college if I got anything to say about it. Besides, you got just as much a right to be there as any spoiled little rich brats._

          “’Cause it’s a waste of money.”

           “Nah, no it’s not. You get what you pay for. Everyone knows that. Besides, you’re too young to be worrying about that. That’s your Mom and me’s business.”

            “Mr. Letz – my math teacher last year said we should go to cheap colleges and save money for grad school.”

            “We’ll figure that out later on. Maybe you won’t even _want_ to go to grad school.”

           Crys took a sip of her soda – technically, seltzer mixed with Tru-Blood and a little sugar syrup. “Well…it’s a women’s college.”

          “So?”

           “So what if I’m not even a woman?”

           That one threw Freddy for a loop. “Well…what the hell _else_ would you be?”

           Crys looked a little cowed, but she kept talking. “I’ve been reading online, and there’s…like…other genders besides just ‘man’ and ‘woman.’ They have them all over the world, you know. In India, and some Native American tribes, and even in the Old Testament a little bit. Well, not the Old Testament exactly, one of the books that goes with it – the _Mishnah_ , I think it’s called. They’ve got, like, six genders in that. And anyway, there’s this one thing called ‘genderqueer’ – not in the Mishnah; on the internet I mean; well, in real life, too, but I learned it on the internet – and I looked it up, and…I don’t know. I think maybe I might be that.”

           Freddy stayed silent. He was totally lost, but he also had the sense that he got with Annie sometimes, where saying the wrong thing was going to result in someone shoving a pipe bomb into his gut.

          What did he know about this? _Well, I know about transsexuals a little, right?  Like Baker. Sort of. (Has she been hanging around Baker too much?) But I’ve heard of them. Maybe this is that_. “Are you…a boy trapped in a girl’s body, you think?” he tried.

           Crys shrugged, face looking red. “Maybe. I don’t know yet.”

           Freddy slowly relaxed back into the state of mild confusion he’d been experiencing ever since Crys had told him she was probably gay a year ago. Since she’d hit puberty, really. After all, he hadn’t been around to watch Kathy go through that, not that he felt too robbed of that particular experience. “Well…that’s okay.”

            “Don’t tell Mom, okay?”

            “Wasn’t gonna.”

           “I mean, I’m going to tell her at some point, but like…”

            “Yeah, I know. Your Mom is your Mom.” Wasn’t that ever the fucking truth about Annie.

           “Yeah.”

           Sven had been watching them from behind the bar; it was a weekday night, and raining, so the place was nearly empty. Freddy knew the albino-looking pussy of a vampire was always uneasy when Freddy was in his bar, which was unfortunate for Sven Svensen as this tavern was the only source of alcohol for miles. Now, Freddy waved him over. Crys was probably ready to order, and he needed a refill.

* * *

 

           Freddy got the old red Chevy up to the Place mostly through force of will, and also through the power of excessive profanity. A normal car, and not the supernatural dream-manifestation of the car that had held his mortal remains for decades, would have gotten stuck in the mud halfway up the mountain, especially when they went from paved road to dirt path. As it was, they made it up to the rocky clearing at the summit, where normally you could see for miles around. Tonight, it was low and rainy and foggy, and, as Freddy might have explained, you couldn’t see dick.

            “Should we go out and find her?” Crys asked. “I’ll do it,” she added quickly, with a glance at Freddy’s expression.

             “No, you’re staying in here,” Freddy told her, thinking of the cow Annie would have if Crys’ shoes got wet and mud-covered, which they would. He honked the horn a couple times. _Tara’s kid_ , he thought idly.

* * *

  _“Tara’s got a kid now?” he’d asked Robert “Pennywise” Gray (??-1986- ) when he heard._

_“Well, yes,” said the clown matter-of-factly, but then he grinned. “Time does get away from us when it’s linear, doesn’t it, Fred?”_

_“You’re telling me.” It was hard to think of the awkward little ginger “Aspie” who’d come to Reality X years before being grown up now, let alone reproducing. “Who knocked her up?”_

_“She didn’t say. Didn’t seem to want to talk about it. I got the impression it didn’t work out between them. Maybe they’re not involved anymore. Oh, and would you believe it? That ‘Sidious’ person finally died, apparently, and she ended up getting his throne.”_

_Freddy snorted. “Tara as a dictator? Now, that I can’t imagine. That kid was afraid of her own shadow.”_

_Bob shrugged. “I guess she grew into herself?”_

_“So she turned out to be his kid, after all? Sidious?”_

_“Apparently.”_

_“So her mother actually fucked that wrinkly old” –_

_It was Bob’s turn to snort. “Annie fucked you.”_

_“Shut up.”_

* * *

           “Dad,” Crys said, as Freddy looked up from adjusting the radio dial. She was pointing at something outside the windshield. “There.” Freddy turned.

          The figure in white emerged slowly from the rain and fog, at first seeming to glide. As Freddy peered through the deluge, however, he realized this was not because of any special grace on her part, but rather because she was taking excessively slow, cautious steps through the mud and puddles. She was dragging behind her one bag; the other was strapped to her back. The rest had come ahead of her; Freddy had seen Annie loading it into her spare room.

          Crys started to get out of the car to help her get her stuff into the trunk; Freddy growled and got out instead. He stomped to the kid and seized her bigger bag, feeling the rain pool in the brim of his hat as he threw it, and her backpack, into the trunk. “Get in,” he snapped. “Around the other side, in front,” he added, watching Crys shimmying over the seats into the back for the new girl. It seemed to take her a moment to understand, but then she obeyed in silence. Cursing more to himself under his breath, he slammed the trunk shut.

           Once everyone was back in the car, and the girl had pulled down her sodden hood, Freddy got his first good look at little Tara’s brat, Aoife Majella Palpatine. He was surprised; the girl didn’t look like Tara at all.

           The primary difference, of course, was that Tara had been, well...  _white_. Very white. Pale gingery red-gold hair, long and flowing, and the kind of skin that burned rather than tanned, that never seemed to get any color to it. This girl…Freddy didn’t exactly know what term might fit for her, but she wasn’t white. Her skin was olive, maybe, or the color of coffee with a lot of milk. Not dark, but definitely not just a tan, either. Freddy had never considered himself a racist – he hated people in general, and as far as he could remember, had never killed an inordinate number of non-white kids, or killed the black kids first, or anything like that. Was it…weird…that he’d expected Tara’s kid to also be white? _Nah,_ he decided; it was just natural to expect a kid to look like its parent.

           Of course, there were other things, too. Where Tara had been slender and willowy, this girl was stocky, even chubby. At least she had some curves, from what Freddy could make out; the robes she was wearing were billowy, a little baggy, but the rain had flattened them against her body to reveal a generous bust for her age and wide, round hips. Instead of Tara’s flowing red hair, she had black hair that had been pulled back tightly, and that the rain had further plastered to her head. Still, even now, as it warmed in the dry car, Freddy could see a few strands of it frizzing up, escaping their coiffure and curling themselves back into their natural position. The girl noticed him looking; she raked a hand over her hair, trying to flatten it down again without much success. He did notice Tara’s same blue eyes, darting out from under dark, arching brows and heavy lashes.

           <Hello,> Aoife greeted them both, in tones – so to speak – that were pleasant, but blank. That was the other thing; he could remember Annie and Bob talking about it. The telepathy. Apparently the kid was “nonverbal,” whatever that meant, so she could only talk by using the Force. Freddy wondered how the fuck that was going to play out at Derry High. <Thank you for coming to get me.> Still drying out himself, wearing a soaked-through wool sweater and a dripping hat, Freddy didn’t have a civil response.

           “No problem,” Crys said, saving the day. She leaned over the seat-back and grinned at Aoife. “Hi, I’m Crys.” She indicated Freddy. “That’s my Dad, Mr. Krueger. How should we address you?”

           Aoife hesitated, and for a minute Freddy thought she really was going to insist on all that “Your Majesty” crap, being technically a princess apparently, but she just smiled at Crys, a little more naturally than her previous expression of general, cautious pleasantness had been. <Hi. Um, don’t worry, Aoife is fine. It’s, um, it’s nice to meet you.> She nodded at Freddy, looking more guarded, her smile dimming a little. <Nice to meet you, too, Mr. Krueger.>

           _If you’re gonna take over after your mother on the throne, you’re gonna have to learn to lie better than that_ , Freddy thought, but didn’t say it for Crys’ sake. Instead, he said, “Buckle up, both of you,” before shifting into gear.

* * *

            It was late and once upon a time, the boardinghouse that was just a few miles off from Annie’s house, in the town of Jerusalem’s Lot, would have been closed for the night. But that seemed a little hypocritical to Eva Miller, who ran the place, given the erratic hours that townspeople seemed to have since the Change. Besides, for obvious reasons, it just wasn’t good for business.

           Still, she had been napping, if not asleep early for the night, when the bell downstairs rang. Wrapping herself in a robe and trying to smooth down her bed-head as she ran down to the front desk, she felt immediately even more embarrassed about the way she looked, and wished even more that she’d stayed awake later, maybe taken a shower.

           The new guests were a man and a girl. The man was clearly old by their race’s standards, but most humans who saw him would have figured he was young, perhaps early middle age at the most, with a narrow face, good cheekbones, alabaster skin, and shoulder-length dark hair. Everything from his movements to the way he was smiling at Eva seemed to warm her inwardly; she felt a blush rising on her own features.

          The girl was also old, but younger; and in physical age, she barely looked as if she might be in high school. Everything about her seemed blank; washed out: the pallor of her skin, the dishwater-blondness of her hair, and the iciness in her eyes. Her look toward Eva was carefully expressionless; perhaps calculating. She stood behind the man, as if attending him.

          “Good evening,” the man said through the most charming smile Eva had ever seen. When she put out her hand for him to shake, he actually bowed over it and put it to his lips momentarily. Eva had never actually, physically witnessed anyone do that before. “I am so sorry for the hour. I hope we didn’t wake you?”

          “It’s fine,” said Eva’s mouth, which seemed to be ahead of the rest of her. “So, um…one room? Two rooms?”

          “A suite, if you have one, please.” The man nodded. “One room with two beds, otherwise.”

          “Our bridal suite?” Eva began to regain her game face, but it was a slow process. “That’s open.”

          The man looked eminently satisfied. “That will do wonderfully, my dear. Thank you.”

           “And your name?” Eva realized the question had sounded too brusque. “Sorry, I need something to write down. Do you have a credit card? It’s not necessary, up here, but it might be helpful for both of us.”

          “I’m afraid that I don’t. I can pay, I assure you. As for names, I am John Smith, and this is my daughter, Jane.” He indicated the girl. “We came over hoping to avoid some of the… _trouble_ that there’s been, in the old country. Perhaps you know…”

          Eva felt a cold pit open up in her stomach. She herself didn’t have any family in Europe, but the McAshtons did – the McAshtons had family everywhere, it seemed – and besides that, she’d _heard_ things; of course she had, _everyone_ had. “Of course; I understand. Completely.” Perhaps they’d had to leave in a hurry. “Are” – _Are you both all right?_ was on the tip of her tongue, but maybe that was too presumptuous; she’d only just met them, and she reminded herself that people around here had an unusual lack of boundaries compared to the rest of the world.

           Instead she said, “If money’s tight for you right now, I can give you credit until you” –

          The man’s smile turned touched, even sympathetic. “That won’t be necessary. We are very well-supplied. But I thank you for your kind concern. Forgive me, but…we are tired…” He pushed some large bills into Eva’s hand. “Could we have the keys, please?”

           “Oh, of course.” Eva pocketed the money and fished under the desk until she had both the keys. She handed them to the man, a little clumsily. “Welcome to ‘salem’s Lot. And welcome to Reality X.”

* * *

            Crys Wilkes-Krueger was nothing if not helpfulness personified. She had been raised in a Christian home; a redeemed, penitent Christian home, which is the most Christian kind. She had spent her childhood with a mother who went through days where almost nothing could cheer her up – or almost nothing. Some affection from her child (a cup of tea, a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, or one of Crys’ picture books read aloud to her as she huddled under a pile of blankets) was the only thing that seemed to help. She had been to Sunday school at Saint Olaf’s outside Salem’s Lot, with Orla McAshton and all her siblings and cousins, and then gone back to the hulking McAshton house afterward many days for playdates or Sunday lunch. Later, at home, she would hear the story over and over of how the McAshtons had helped her mother when she first came to Maine; they had given her clothes, money for medication, and even help with birthing Crys, as well as free doula service after Crys was born, until Annie could get back on her meds.

            And of course – when she was a little older – she had helped out with the SKS.

            It wasn’t the best name; “the Serial Killers’ Society.” Bob Gray had named it, because he’d founded it, and his grasp of English could be tenuous at times, since it was not his native tongue. As it was, Crys, her mother, and probably quite a few members besides Annie, felt that the name gave the wrong idea. It implied that they were, well, a society for serial killers. Actually, Crys still remembered Annie explaining to her around fourth grade or so, it was more of a support group. “It’s a little bit like those lunch groups you go to with Mrs. Duvall sometimes on Thursdays,” she had explained, meaning the special lunch club for children of divorcing or broken families that the Derry Elementary’s school psychologist held, rather sporadically. “When people have all gone through the same kinds of trouble, more or less, sometimes they get together to help each other out. Sometimes it’s easier to talk about it with other people who are like them.”

             And as she’d gotten older, Crys had realized more and more that the somewhat strange people who’d looked after her when she wandered off as a child, or come over when Annie was having a bad time, or in Mikey Myers and the Sinclair brothers’ case made her beautiful masks or porcelain-like wax dolls on her birthdays, had seen terrible things, and done terrible things. It was a notion that she still had to rediscover again and again, even now, at seventeen, and it came as a shock every time. There was a dissonance that arose from trying to associate the people who had taken care of her with violence and death. Some days, she couldn’t process it at all, except by remembering Sunday school, and the times Father Dimitri would come over to pray and study the Gospels with Annie individually. “ _All have sinned, and fallen short of the glory of the Lord.”_

            So she had cooked for them and helped them learn to read in some cases, and made them Christmas cards alongside her cards for Annie and Freddy, and now that she had a license she drove them around when it was needed, since most of them didn’t have cars, or any knowledge of driving. From the beginning, Crys understood about herself as a human; she had had no illusions about what anyone – including her – was capable of becoming.

            In this world, ordinary people could murder children, or their families. But in this same world, undead men and women, who had killed enough to fill entire towns, could still raise a child and build a peaceful community among themselves. It was a strange fact, but an unquestionable part of reality. It was horrifying, but in some strange way, also had beauty to it.

              So Crys was nothing if not helpful, and that included tonight, when she passed by Aoife Palpatine’s guest room, to find the girl sitting on the bed, half-unpacked, staring at nothing. It was the look of a shell-shocked person, like Annie when her anti-psychotics had expired, so Crys sat down next to her and asked, “Need a break from unpacking?”

            Aoife nodded, as if she wasn’t capable even of her own mode of speech, so Crys led her down to her room and opened a bag of chips she’d stolen from the pantry. “Ever hear of MST3K? _Mystery Science Theater 3000?_ No?” She brought up the next episode in the playlist on her laptop. “Mind if we watch this for a while?”

            Aoife was silent and still as they watched the riff of _Red Zone Cuba_ , except that she flapped her arms a bit while its theme song, "Night Train to Mundo Fine," played. Crys had seen Arianrod flap when she was excited; she knew what it meant. “I know, right?” she told Aoife now. “I guess it’s supposed to be a bad song, from how they’re riffing it. But I like it.”

            The princess began to loosen up a few videos later, during a riff of some _Young American_ -era PSA, _Keeping Neat And Clean_ , and Crys couldn’t help but laugh when they watched a boy get out of bed too slowly, and Aoife burst out, <He’s got a hangover!>

            It wasn’t exactly a joke, in its tone or delivery, but the tension snapped like a thread pulled too tight, and soon they were both trying to hold back tears amid peals of laughter.

            Annie opened the door at the noise. “You’re both still up? It’s getting late, and Aoife! You’re not even unpacked yet! And Crys, you know the rules about food in bed” –

             After Aoife had gone back to her own room, Crys began, “Mom, I’m sorry about the chips” –

              Annie hugged her, and pecked her forehead. “I know. It’s all right.” And Crys realized Annie had figured out what she was trying to do. Her mother could be slow about things like this, sometimes, since she had to wade past her own immediate instincts, but in Crys’ experience she got there in the end.


	2. Chapter 2

           Aoife opened her eyes in the strange bed, in the strange room, in the strange house. And, as had become usual in the mornings, she was racked with anxiety.

           _Start your exercises_. But they wouldn’t help; she knew from experience that the sit-ups, push-ups, and teras-kasi katas would do nothing, or next to nothing, for this. _I’ll do them in a few minutes, when I’m out of this_.

            Staggering out of bed on stiff, unstretched legs, she pulled herself over to the bookcase. After a few moments of looking, Aoife decided the books must have belonged to the girl who lived here before, Arianrod Tasini, since they looked too unconventional for Annie’s taste. Reading might calm her, though, and so she picked a likely-looking one that sat on the edge of its shelf, instead of standing upright, pushed in among the others. She read the title. _The Complete Persepolis_ , _by Marjane Satrapi_. The cover artwork was strangely soothing: smooth, simple cartoon figures, looking slightly like woodcuts, entirely in black and white, bordered by a turquoise blue background. Aoife opened it, to see if there would be more illustrations like these inside. There were; it appeared to be a graphic novel. Aoife hadn’t read many of those.

            Nearly an hour later, Annie came in to wake the girl up, and found her still reading. “Oh, you found the books,” she said, unable to hide her smile. “Which one’s that? _Persepolis_? Oh, I’ve heard that one’s really good. I don’t like comic books much, myself. Or graphic novels, I guess,” she added, coloring faintly at using the wrong term.

            Aoife forced herself to look up from the book and smile at Annie. <It is pretty good,> she said. She considered saying more, but found that her vocabulary was failing her, and she couldn’t find the words.

            The truth was that she had never before met anyone – or rather, heard of anyone – who had also thought, as a young child, that they were somehow holy. Marjane Satrapi had believed she was a prophet, the last prophet of Islam, and had talked to their God at night before going to sleep. Aoife had felt similar; she could still remember the “bible” that she had tried to write at about five, after learning the story of how she was born, and learning about the Earth religions from Grandma Willa. Religion on Earth seemed different from Coruscant, or even Naboo. It was something people talked about, even shouted about; something that people – other than Sith, and Jedi – killed over and devoted their lives to. And one didn’t always need special training or even Force ability to do so. Aoife had known about other species from the time she was a baby, living at the central hub of the civilized galaxy, but she had not known so many other philosophies.

           Being a part of the Sith, even as a child, how could she not have been attracted to an idea that held such tangible _power?_

           She still remembered the first time that her mother told her about her birth. “We weren’t sure I could even have you,” she’d explained, and Aoife was vaguely surprised to hear about her real father, since her mother never talked about him, and insisted she and Wallis treat Captain Kir Kanos with the respect owed to the caring father figure he was. “Especially because of how different from me – from _us_ – your father was. But then we found out I was going to have you after all, even though the doctors and med droids hadn’t thought I could, and we were so excited. And then when you were born, everything that happened – you took your first breath too soon, and you choked on some of the amniotic fluid, and you had to spend so much time with the preemies in the NICU – you were our ‘miracle child.’”

           And something in Aoife had internalized the Earth religions, and her mother’s story, so that she barely listened to her gush about how Aoife was the biggest baby in the newborns’ intensive care unit, which was usually filled with premature infants, or how Aoife’s “first kiss” had been on her sister Wallis’ hand. And it seemed as if the Force had saved her for some reason. Some days, it actually felt as if her impending Imperial regime was approved by the Force, or by whatever other cosmic power there was. That was irrational, however, so she never told anyone about it.

 

           She and Annie drank their morning tea – Lipton Black for Annie, green for Aoife – on the back steps, and Aoife looked out over the Wilkes’ back yard. It was a broad field that disappeared downhill, into what looked like a forest. In the distance was a view of mountains.

           “It’s so big, isn’t it?” Annie remarked. “I remember when we – when _I_ first moved to Colorado, even before I came here. I wasn’t exactly a city girl like you, but I’d still never seen so much wide-open space before. It can be frightening. It must be a big adjustment.”

           Aoife nodded, still feeling unable to speak. She had been in big countries before – Convergence, the old family lodge back on Naboo, and a couple times on a trip to the Sith ruins on Korriban – but somehow this felt different. Maybe it was because she wasn’t with her family this time; was living among strangers. The vastness of the land seemed to suck at her, demanding some deep thought or accomplishment in exchange for allowing her to live in such expanse. It was blue and green and misty and watery, like Naboo but without the gaudiness of the flowers and gardens and artistic villas everywhere. It was like she had always imagined Avalon would be when she read the _King Arthur_ legends as a child, one holiday on Earth at her grandmother’s. This land was ancient, and vast, and it _watched_ her, like the eyes of a Cosmic Being or the Force.

* * *

 

Her flimsiplast booties slid a few centimeters on the tile, but she was holding onto the railing along the wall, and didn’t lose her balance. There was a deep, long crashing sound somewhere behind her, as if the building was slowly crumbling away into the seas on the planet’s crust, the ones they said in the downlevels would rise up someday and drown them all. It sounded distant. All the noise sounded distant, muffled somehow. Everything felt muffled, and slowed down. The hospital lights flickered above her head.

There was a hospital room door ahead of her. She did not want to see what was inside it.

She would not look.

She would not look.

She would not look.

There was one bed inside the room. It was dark, its glow-strips burned out. A crowd of doctors, med droids, troopers, and Red Guards stood around the bed. Her mother and sister and Kanos stood there, too.

She managed to run past the doorway, this time.

The hallway ahead ended in nothingness; it broke off there, jutting out into the sky, nothing but cracked wall and tiles, a few severed, sparking wires sticking out.

The Coruscant skyline looked ragged, a mouth just struck, missing teeth. How much of the city had they destroyed?

It was still smoking.

The people’s pain was all around her. She could not keep it out. She did not want to. She did not deserve to. She crumpled on the floor, letting it fill her up.

Footsteps beside her. She looked up, wiping her eyes with sore, tingling, numb fingers.

<Krueger?> Once it hit her, she curled back up and waited. <Fuck.>

“I’m not here for that,” he croaked from over her head. “What is this place?”

<Coruscant,> she managed.

“It always look like this?”

<Of course not,> she heard herself nearly growl. <There was an attack.>

She heard him clear his throat. “Oh yeah. Right. Heard about that.”

<Why are you _here? >_

“No reason. I just like to look around. I get bored.” She turned her glare on him again, and watched with a little satisfaction as he backed off slowly. “Sweet dreams, Princess,” he managed to snort before he turned the corner and disappeared from her sight.

<Jackass,> Aoife muttered, waking herself up from the dream. She felt adrenaline-flooded, and slick with sweat all over, shivering in the Maine night air. As she hobbled up to change into less sweat-soaked nightclothes and shut the windows a little, she wondered how many more times she’d have to encounter not just the nightmare hospital, but Fred Krueger poking his damn head in where it didn’t belong. _Either fight me and try to kill me, or get out of my dreams._

* * *

 

          Out here, it was so quiet one could sleep until the end of time, or at least Aoife thought so. It was annoying, therefore, that Annie was waking her up. It was still mostly dark outside her window; on the horizon, the night had just begun to give way to a thin gray light. Aoife groaned.

          “I know,” Annie said apologetically. “There’s an emergency over at the Johnsons’. Your mother said you might want to be my assistant so you could learn a few things while you were here. I think she meant the Celestial Council, of course, but this could be educational, too. Crys and I are heading over there now. Will you come?”

           Aoife had somehow developed, unusually for a Sith apprentice, she knew, an acute sense of guilt. It tended to trouble her not just about moral failings, but other failings, as well. If she didn’t know enough to know that Freud was mostly full of shit, she would call it a “superego.” When she missed an opportunity to practice social skills, she felt guilty. When she had a meltdown, she felt guilty. When she fought with her parents, even if she thought she was right, she felt guilty. When she received criticism, she felt both guilty and ashamed.

            She knew that if she didn’t come with Annie and Crys, and missed out on whatever skills Annie might teach her, she would feel guilty, and spoiled.

            <I’ll go,> she told Annie.

            The other woman nodded approvingly. “I’ll help you get dressed.” Aoife was too tired and stiff to refuse her.

* * *

 

           Maine up here felt secluded and empty compared to Coruscant, like Naboo but lonelier. It reminded Aoife most of all of Korriban, but absent the ruins and rocky chasms and long-abandoned quarries. But there was still the sense of the present and its occupants as squatters on the land of the past, unwelcome colonialists who barely managed to tame their new world, who could only hope to eke out a living, maintaining control only slightly. There was the sense of great forces held at bay only barely by the skin of the teeth, like a great lake held back by a dam.

          Aoife shook her head. She reflected that despite the strong black tea Annie had made for all three of them, poured into one thermos for her and Crys with a second for Aoife, she must still be sleepy, to have such bizarre and abstract thoughts. She tried not to fall back asleep, knowing she’d only be even groggier when they reached the Johnsons’ house if she did. She drank more tea, and looked out the window.

          She had been to the town of Derry once already on a grocery shopping trip with Crys and Annie. It was a pinched town, a purposefully, oppressively quiet place; the town equivalent of her school library back on Andara, where the strict librarian did not allow any talking at all, even quiet whispering. One felt that there was a law against making too much noise here.

          At night, the pressure to be silent was even stronger, because the town looked deserted. Derry at night seemed abandoned, from the garbage on the streets and the boarded-up windows of shops taken either by the recession, or by the Wal-Mart just across the river. It was almost post-apocalyptic. And so, so quiet.

          Deep under the town, Aoife knew, lived the entity called “Robert Gray.” She hadn’t met him yet, only knew him through Annie and Crys, neither of whom had a bad word to say about him…but he frightened her a bit. A being so old, so unseen, so powerful…the idea of his existence was something larger than fact, like religion or urban legend, and made her feel small.

* * *

 

          The Johnsons’ house stuck out on its dark street, just beyond Derry proper, as being the only house with lights on in its windows. The houses here were more suburban; not necessarily well-to-do, but more similar, boxy pseudo-colonial designs that still managed to look bigger and more modern than Annie’s. The lawns were trim and well-mowed, looking like rectangles of carpeting in the dark, far from Crys and Annie’s plot of grass, wildflowers, and crabgrass. It reminded Aoife unpleasantly of Naboo, only even more impossibly controlled and polished, and far less aesthetically pleasing.

           They walked up to the house in the chilly early-morning air, and Annie rang the doorbell. The dim light of the moon and the near-dawn made everything look unfamiliar and otherworldly. Aoife and Crys stood together in silence.

            The middle-aged woman who let them in was tired, with large dark circles under her eyes and relaxed dark hair pulled back messily. She wore a cross around her neck, a bit similar to Annie’s. It did not seem to be working.

           “He wouldn’t eat dinner,” she explained in a voice that was pure exhaustion as she led them through the dimly-lit house. “Then he started yelling at himself around midnight, and then calling for food, but then he wouldn’t eat it _again_ …” she trailed off scratchily and sobbed for just a second.

          “I see,” said Annie solidly, and not coldly. “We’ll get Tim anything he needs, Lisa. You and Colin try to go back to bed.”

          “Easier said than done,” said Tim’s mother darkly. “Especially when he screams.”

          “I know. Maybe you ought to check into a motel for the night? I can help you out with money if you need it”-

           “My husband and I are staying in this house,” said Lisa Johnson flatly, and Annie didn’t say anything else.

* * *

 

           What Aoife would remember about the night was how surreal it felt, sitting up and waiting for something to happen – for something to change – in another person’s house just before sunrise. She felt almost as if she was part of a death watch. Tim Johnson did not wake up, and when the sun finally rose and Aoife half-awoke (had she been awake, or dozing? There was no way to be sure in the dim, chilly silence) and felt the change in the air, she almost expected to hear a death rattle from the bed.

           Looking back, she would remember the stillness, and the exhausted fitfulness on the edge of sleep – knowing you could not drop off, but also feeling sleep tug on you with every second that passed.

          She hoped she would not remember the bed, with its straps attached to thin brown wrists and ankles, flesh stretched over bones and blue veins. She hoped not to remember the stale-smelling blankets piled onto the thin figure, which could not be seen, and stirred only faintly. And she hoped she would not remember her terror whenever he moved, that he might escape the blankets, and she might have to see his face; for some reason, the idea filled her with terror.

          Later, back at Annie’s and after her nap, Aoife realized she would never go back to the Johnson house – hopefully, would never go to another sick, dying house – again.


	3. Chapter 3

         “Orla?”

         Orla looked up from the microscope, blinking hard. It was really starting to hurt, trying to look through this thing with weak red eyes that were evolved to be nocturnal. It didn’t help that this microscope was secondhand (a gift, possibly stolen, from Uncle Dwight), and older, but the main problem was the light. _Maybe I can adapt the design to make it dimmer_.

         She turned toward her older brother Owain, standing in the doorway of the bedroom. “Yeah?”

          He leaned against the doorframe, which creaked, his brow furrowing. “What are you looking at?”

          “Tru-Blood. I wanted to see how it looked different from biological blood on the cellular level.” She pointed to the picture of the red blood cells in her book.

          “You’re not gonna stop drinking it, are you?”

          “Of course not. What else would I drink?”

          The ghost of a smile crossed Owain’s face, but he didn’t comment on how strange the question would sound, anywhere but the McAshton family. It took Orla herself a minute to remember why it was a silly question. “I could also drink coconut water,” she pointed out instead. “If I wanted to be all-natural.”

          “How _vegan_ of you,” he laughed.

          “It’s not just for vegans. Other people do it. Sis drinks it when she’s pregnant because she’s worried about preservatives.”

          “I know,” he told her. “It was a joke. Mom and Dad want to talk to you.”

          “Oh.” Orla couldn’t help but feel a little nervous. Why hadn’t one of them just come up to her themselves? “Why? Did they seem mad?”

          “I don’t think so. Just go talk to them.” If he knew what it was about, he didn’t indicate it. Orla switched off the microscope light and headed downstairs.

 

         She shivered as she entered her father’s study. Both her parents were sitting on the couch waiting for her. Her father looked profoundly uncomfortable, but for that matter, so did her mother. Her mother looked downright disgusted, in fact. Orla swallowed.

           “Orla, will you sit down, please?” her father asked.

             Orla sank onto the chair behind her, feeling chilled. “Am I in trouble?”

         “No,” said Ranulf quickly, even as Svet asked, “Why? _Should_ you be?” She surrendered under her husband’s glare.

         Orla shook her head _no_. She knew her mother; Svetlana McAshton (née Svensen) was not a fuzzy person, or a diplomatic person. Sometimes, like Orla, she didn’t know the best way to say things.

         “We aren’t sure how to tell you,” her father said now. “But we have some…news.”

         _Am I sick? What if I have to stop taking my pills?_ Orla swallowed. “Dad, I’m starting to get scared.”

           Ranulf’s face fell. “Oh no, my love, nothing is wrong,” he insisted as Svet nodded beside him, also looking concerned. “We just aren’t sure how to start it. Maybe it’s best just to say it…

            “Barlow came to see us today,” he explained. He wrinkled his nose slightly, as if whiffing something foul. “He…ah…”

           “He asked for your hand,” Svet said bluntly.

          For a few seconds, Orla was nonplussed.

          “In marriage,” Ranulf clarified. He was turning pink around the ears. Even Svet, cut as she usually seemed to be from ice or marble, was blushing.

         “He’s from the old country,” her father continued. “They do things differently there. And things change more slowly.”

         Orla found her voice. “But I’ve never even _talked_ to him before.”

         “That should tell you something,” her mother said grimly. “About what kind of man he is, that he wants to marry some young girl he’s never had a single conversation with.”

          Orla agreed. “So…” she realized there might be a chance, no matter how remote, that her parents had actually said yes. “What did you _tell_ him?”

          “We didn’t accept,” Svet assured her quickly.

          “We told him we had to discuss it with you,” Ranulf elaborated. “We told him we wouldn’t force you to do anything you didn’t want to do.”

          A new thought was unfolding in Orla’s head. “Wait…does that mean you’d _let_ me?”

          A long silence followed her question.

         Her father shrugged, a little helplessly. “In human years, you’re older than eighteen. Soon you’ll be out of high school. We don’t have much right to stop you.”

          “But you don’t _want_ to.” Svet looked questioningly at her daughter. “ _Do_ you?”

          “No.” The word was out before Orla thought about it. “I mean…I don’t _think_ so.”

          “You aren’t _sure?”_ Ranulf still looked bewildered. “Orla – dear – it’s _Barlow_.” He tried again. “The man is… _ancient_. He may be older than I am. And…”

          “And batshit,” Svet added.

          “I know…but…” Orla shrugged, turning pink, knowing she couldn’t put it into words. She didn’t even understand it herself. Something in her just didn’t feel like immediately rejecting the idea, even if she wasn’t sure why yet.

         “Think of your future,” her mother pointed out. “You want to go to college, don’t you?”

         “Maybe he’d let me,” Orla found herself arguing. “He knows I’m young, and it’s not like there’s that much for me to do just staying around that house.” She smiled ruefully. “Not like I’m going to be getting pregnant right after the wedding or anything, after all.”

         There was a long pause. Orla’s parents clearly hadn’t anticipated this response. In fact, Orla herself wasn’t entirely sure where this was coming from. Sure, there was something kind of flattering, even a little old-school charming, about someone asking for your hand in marriage, but it couldn’t be having _that_ much of an effect on her, could it?

         Ranulf recovered first. “Well, then, it seems we should ask Barlow over so that the three of us can speak with him,” he decided, still sounding amazed. “We would have had questions, regardless. There are certain things that I would insist on including in the marriage certificate, for one thing. I suppose we don’t need to decide anything right now. We have a while.”

         Svet was now staring at her husband. “Ranulf, we’re not going to”-

         “I said I wouldn’t force our daughter to do anything she doesn’t want to do. That must include rejecting him, I suppose.” Ranulf took a deep breath. “We should all calm down. Nothing has been decided yet. Nothing has changed. We are simply getting more information.” He put a large white hand on his wife’s thin shoulder, and held the other out to Orla. “Whatever happens, _iubita_ , your mother and I will support you, and we will give you whatever help you need.”

 

         Now the sun was going down, so Orla was supposed to be watering the back vegetable garden, since she couldn’t stand the smell of the chicken coop. In fact, she was staring into space. Since the talk with her parents, she didn’t seem to be able to move too fast. She couldn’t even claim to be pensive, because her mind felt absolutely blank.

          “Orla,” said her father’s voice behind her. “If you aren’t going to water them, we should turn off the hose. We don’t want to waste the water.”

          Orla jumped slightly and turned. “Uh. Sorry. Yeah.”

           Ranulf turned the faucet off. “Your mother sent me out. She was worried you forgot to put on sunscreen.” He handed her the tube.

           Orla frowned. “I never forget to put on sunscreen.”

           “I know that. But she was worried.” He paused. “I think she’s more worried about you than usual, now that this is going on.”

          Orla shrugged, not sure what to say to that.

         Ranulf moved closer. “Are you worried, Orla?” he asked. “About…anything?”

          “I still want to…I’m still not saying no yet, I still want to have him over to talk through stuff” –

          “Oh, I know. But you can be secure in your decision and still feel a little nervous.” He shrugged. “If you have anything you’d like to talk to me about, you can do it.”

         Racking her brain, now, Orla couldn’t think of anything… _oh wait_.

         Yes she could. Of course she could. How could she have even forgotten it in the first place _(does that mean I am somehow faking it for attention after all, even after all these years, oh God what do I do if I want to go back on it all later)?_

         “If…if we do this,” she told her father now. “If I do end up saying yes and going through with it, he’s got to know…” She looked up at him significantly, and not a little anxiously. “Before the wedding night. Because he’s going to…he’s going to expect some stuff…”

         “Oh…” Ranulf shook his head as it dawned on him. “Oh, of course. Yes, you’re right…I suppose he will…” a momentary look of disgust, probably at the idea of his daughter’s wedding night (that _had_ to be it; ~~she didn’t want to know what was making him disgusted~~ ), crossed his face.

        “He doesn’t know.” Orla shook her head. “Because Salem’s Lot got Changed after he moved here, and you guys had already renamed me and everything by then…he doesn’t _know_ , Dad.”

         “Well, we’ll tell him, of course,” Ranulf tried to soothe her.

        “Will you do it, Dad? You’re another man.”

         Ranulf paused; he probably hadn’t expected to have _that_ conversation; with Barlow of all people. “I guess, if you would feel most comfortable that way.”

        “Do it before the wedding, okay?”

         “Of course. What are you afraid of, _iubita?”_ Ranulf reached out to run his fingers down his daughter’s smooth, glossy braid. “That he won’t want to keep the engagement? I suppose that’s a risk, but it’s his loss…”

         “That’s not all it is.” Orla shook her head. “People get _murdered_ over stuff like this, Dad. Guys…some men think they got, I don’t know, _cheated_ , or something, and…you can get murdered that way. And…especially if Barlow is, like… _old-fashioned_ …”

         “That wouldn’t happen to”-

         “The human stat for our life expectancy is only age 23, Dad.” Orla swallowed. “I haven’t done the conversion or anything, but I bet we’ve got the same problems. There’s no _reason_ to think it would be different for us.” She crossed her arms over herself, protectively.

          Ranulf didn’t seem to know what to say to that, except to keep patting her hair. “Your mother and I would never let him hurt you.” He shivered a little himself, in the pre-autumn chill. “I’ll prepare him, _iubita_ , don’t worry.”

* * *

 

            The boardinghouse was the most disgusting, tacky residence that Jane Volturi had stayed at in centuries; ever since leaving her village, as a matter of fact. The bedding was stiff, either too light or too heavy, and the sheets and towels scratched a bit. The pillows were too thin. The carpet was dark and stiff with unseen stains, hidden by its busy pattern. The water had a strange taste; the binder left on the desk in the room said it came from a well. The shampoo and moisturizer were both equally useless, and the room contained no books except a Bible; there was only a television for entertainment. The woman who ran it was supposed to provide meals, but there was no chance of real blood; only revolting Tru-Blood, or coconut water for an extra charge, could be gotten this summer. There wasn’t even any pig or cow blood since the farm that had supplied it had lost their land, and the farmers been forced to move back out of state, according to that Miller woman.

             The rest of this town seemed not to be a vast improvement. She had been excited, of course she had, to see a completely vampire settlement in the New World. But these people lived like the worst kind of fledglings – they still lived like they were humans, busying themselves with meaningless tasks and boundaries and taboos, as if any of it was important anymore, or ever had been in the first place. She was already becoming distrustful of the one who’d turned them, this “Barlow” character. From what she’d heard, despite the obvious fake name, he was one of the decaying nobility of the Countess Dracula, back in the so-called “Motherland.” It figured that he’d have no idea how to care for the fledglings he made; these Olde World types left fledglings in their wakes the way their human counterparts left bastards.

            Besides, nothing _happened_ here. There was an as-yet-unused school, abandoned when the town Changed and never reopened apparently, a post office in similar disrepair, a store and a pub and the boardinghouse, and there didn’t appear to be much else. Whatever people Jane’s age did around here, she couldn’t find it.

           But this…this was the ultimate insult. Someone, at some point, was going to pay for this. Being accused of truancy and forced to go to this “Derry High” as if she was actually just some _child_ was bad enough, but this was too much.

           Being forced to ride the _school bus_.

           They didn’t have a car that could get to Derry and back without attracting attention, and originally that hadn’t been a problem, since neither she nor Aro had been expecting that she would need to spend eight hours of her day, a majority of her week – and during the sunlight hours, too! – in public school. Hence this bus situation.

           A gaggle of teenagers had gathered at the next streetcorner over. The tall girl at the head of the queue, dressed in a lacy shirt and flowered skirt, turned, and before Jane could look away, waved to her, beckoning her over. Jane groaned, but supposed that diplomacy was in order. She pasted a smile on her face and crossed the street.

           “I’m Orla!” the girl introduced herself, shaking Jane’s hand, and indicating the group around her, most of whom did not resemble her in the slightest. “These are my cousins.” Jane tried not to look skeptical. The girl appeared Asian, and most of her companions looked Nordic or Slavic; a few darker-skinned, like Romani. _Like the Usurper Countess_ (Jane tried not to wrinkle her nose). Orla pointed out one in particular, a sallow boy in a rumpled polo shirt reluctantly tucked into khakis. “That’s Klas; it’s his first year in high school. Oh, sorry – what’s your name? Are you a freshperson, too?”

          “Yes,” said Jane without thinking. “I mean – no. It is my first year, but I’m a senior. It’s Jane.” She tried not to glare while simultaneously daring the rest of them to say a word about her height, size, and general appearance.

          If any thought of the sort went through Orla’s head, she didn’t show it. “Cool, I’m a senior myself. What are your plans after school? I think I’m going to go to State and be a bio nerd.”

          “Uh – I’m not sure yet,” Jane managed, which was the truth, more or less. “I might try to work for a bit,” she added, as the bus pulled up.

 

          Most of her family filed toward the back of the bus, but Orla saved a seat for Jane, who figured she might as well. Given how crowded the bus already was, the odds that she’d be able to sit alone were slim, and Orla was better than some random child, especially a human. This was especially true since Orla’s bubbliness didn’t last; after a few minutes of stilted, polite small talk, Jane noticed Orla’s fingers reaching for a paperback out of her bag, and she released the girl to read her book, with relief.

           Jane herself took little notice of the stops that came after, able to withdraw into her mind even as the bus jostled them. She only came out of her trance when she realized Orla was trying to get her attention. “Jane, can you move in for Crys?”

           Jane emerged and looked up into the face of the new girl, Crys. She was a human, although this was not immediately apparent thanks to her other attributes. She was tall and muscular, yet slender, with tanned, freckled skin and auburn-brown hair, and kind hazel eyes that regarded Jane gently from under sensitive eyelashes and a well-formed brow. She was dressed in earthy tones; a loose green shirt and loose jeans that hung on her hips that, under her shirt, must drop slightly below her belly button, leaving its soft, tender skin exposed to the air. For some reason Jane found herself briefly musing on the loveliness of an athletic, slender pelvis: the curve of the bone under the skin, the fragility of the navel, and the delicacy of the thin trail of hair that would run from the navel downward. Crys was standing above her; Jane realized she was separated by just a single layer of green cotton from tracing down the girl’s body with her tongue.

          She remembered herself and quickly made Crys room. “Hello, my name is Jane” –

          “Hi, Jane, nice to meet you.” Crys looked happy to see her, but then her attention broke away to attend to her companion, a stumpy, dull-looking brown-skinned girl in black. “Here, Aoife, you sit right on the end of that seat, you’ll still be next to us.

           “So,” she directed her attention back to Jane, as Aoife followed Orla’s example and took out some gadget attached to earphones at length, putting them on. “Um…you seem new here; did you just move here, or” –? She blushed, charmingly.

            “Only just.” Jane tried to smile at Crys; she realized she already was, and smiled harder. “We’re staying at Eva Miller’s boardinghouse. My father and I.”

            “Cool. Well, if you need any help getting some clothes or supplies or, like, jobs, or anything, St. Olaf’s church can probably help you. I, um, I volunteer there, so…” She looked down. “I mean, I don’t know how okay you are with religious stuff. I know it varies. I mean, it varies for everyone, I know that, but like…” she trailed off again, then looked up. “Oh my God, I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to offend you.”

          “You didn’t offend me,” Jane reassured her quickly. “That’s so kind, thank you.” She paused, wrestling with herself over how forward to be. She wanted to ask Crys to show her around town, or something similar, but would that be too pushy?

          “Oh!” Crys snapped her fingers. “There’s this thing we do – me and Orla usually – after school called Drawing Club; do you want to come with us?” Even as Jane agreed, Crys was adding to Aoife, tapping the girl until she flinched, “Sorry Aoife, but want to come with us to Drawing Club after school?” to which the girl nodded eagerly.

          Despite the sting of an identical invitation being extended to the human Aoife, Jane couldn’t help but feel anything other than happy at the prospect of spending more time with Crys. Who wouldn’t want to make friends with someone who was clearly so kind and attractive and lovely? Besides, hadn’t Aro said it was all about diplomacy?

 

            Seven hours later, Jane waded through the halls, and couldn’t help but picture herself as a salmon swimming upstream to spawn as she struggled to navigate. The gray and white halls burned her eyes; she didn’t know how any of the vampire students dealt with it.

           By the time she saw Aoife, Jane’s eyes were watering visibly, and she was aware it looked as if she was crying. Though disappointed not to see Crys, she pasted a smile on her face and approached the girl. “Hello, Aoife.”

           The girl finished packing her textbooks and locked her locker back up before responding. <Hi…Jane, right?> Her face colored; to Jane, it looked almost bruise-like.

           Jane forced herself to keep smiling. “That’s right.”

           Aoife’s gaze had managed to linger on her face; now it shuddered and darted around at the crowded hallway. <I’m sorry. I’m not good at names. At home in court, I usually have whole dossiers full of faces and names that I have to study every night.> Her embarrassment seemed to deepen as Jane couldn’t resist drawing out the lull in conversation. <So,> Aoife managed at last. <How was _your_ first day? >

           “Fine,” Jane lied. She had no intention of admitting to this girl how…well… _bruised_ the day had left her. What a strange way to think of it – none of the students or faculty here, especially not the humans, could harm her, and yet her general mood now could best be likened to how one might feel after a beating. “And yours?”

           <It was all right,> Aoife replied, and Jane was sure she was also lying. This was confirmed when Aoife paused a moment, then added carefully, <I had been reading that on this planet – at least in this country – public education was an issue. I think that given how bad education is in some of the other countries here, I thought it would be a minor problem.> She shook her head. <It’s not. Not at all. I could see it today.>

            Jane hadn’t exactly expected this, and talking about it might be more diverting than staring at the opposite wall until Crys or Orla came to find them. “How so?”

           <The class sizes are too big for the teachers to tailor their lessons effectively, and there is too much work,> Aoife explained. <Too much to get through, and too much to bring home, I believe. Especially because some of the teachers strike me as incompetent.> A faint smile curved the corner of her mouth.

           Jane couldn’t help but smile, too. “That’s probably true.”

          <I also think the rules are fairly draconian,> Aoife continued, seeming encouraged. <All these passes, and gods help you if you have the wrong one, or don’t have one at all. Or the limit on absences.> Her smile disappeared, replaced with tension around her mouth and jaw. For a few moments her eyes blinked rapidly, as if they were keeping back tears, but then Jane saw nothing but dryness in them. <If you have to…take care of some need, or you’re sick, the assumption seems to be that you’re lying, and up to no good, until proven otherwise. We seem to have the responsibilities of undergraduates here, but we’re treated like convicts.>

            Jane nodded. She’d seen stricter rules, but for a bunch of human children, most of whom would end up working in shops or in service, this did seem harsh. “I wonder if the rest of their schools are like this?”

             <Some are worse, apparently,> said Aoife darkly. <We’re in a relatively well-off district now. If you go West, I think, or North, you find the really rural school districts, and they’re very poor.>

             “How do you know?”

            <Research.> Aoife shrugged. <Before I came. Besides, I’ve been visiting this world since I was little. I know a pretty good deal of the politics, I think. For an alien,> she added, trying joviality but not quite able to pull it off. She looked to be trying to cheer herself up, or to convince Jane she was all right again. She succeeded at neither. <You can ask me anything you like. I may know it.>

           Jane leaned back to watch for Crys again, feeling ruffled at her own lack of preparation for this mission. There was the internet, wasn’t there? Not to mention others in Voltura who had been to the Americas. She could have prepared. She tried not to glower, in case Crys came and saw.

 

          Now Jane followed Crys, Orla, and Aoife through the now-empty hall and into the large classroom; it was actually two rooms, she realized, which accounted for its size, but the divider that usually split them was folded back. It was a bright, airy room, owing maybe to its white rather than wood- or linoleum-paneled walls, which were hung with art projects and various color charts. At the back of this long room were tall, colorful cabinets; while Aoife sat down by their seats and began doing something on her console, Jane followed Crys and Orla toward the cabinets for, Crys explained, paper and drawing supplies. Around them, other students set up at the tables, alone or in small groups, drawing or engaging in quiet conversation. After the day, Jane reflected, it was a balm to the nerves.

 

             “I miss Tim,” Orla piped up as they drew in companionable silence. It turned out that Aoife drew using her finger on the screen of her console; she explained to Jane, rather curtly now, that it was easier and less painful than trying to grip a pencil or marker. Jane’s own drawing prowess extended far enough that she could sketch Aoife’s water bottle; she blushed pink again at the elaborate fantasy scene Crys was drawing, completely out of her own head. Orla was working on a drawing based on – according to her – how Tru-Blood looked under a microscope. To Jane, it looked fairly abstract, but then, she didn’t know much science.

           “He was always fun,” Crys agreed. “I don’t think the club ever did a project without him. At least, not in years.”

           “Your mom went to see him,” Orla said. “Before school started, right? How is he?”

            Crys’ smile dimmed a few watts. “He’s…not bad. Apparently he’s started talking to himself again, which isn’t good, but none of the other stuff has come back. Yet.”

          “But I don’t understand, that sounds like a good thing? Mostly, anyway. Better. I remember him at the end of last year.”

            “It’s not bad. He hasn’t been responding to any antipsychotics, which is no good, but he’s also not getting worse. Like, the talking to himself thing has been going on for _months_ , and like I said, there’s been nothing besides that. So yeah, it’s not too bad, when you think about last year.” Crys sighed heavily. “He’s not the one I’d worry about, from what Mom says.”

             “Then who?” asked Orla as Aoife beat Jane to asking, <What happened to him last year?>

            Crys shook her head. “He had this really bad nervous breakdown. At least, we think it was that. Mom and Dr. Lecter never really figured it out, but like, there was nothing neurologically or hormonally wrong with him, so yeah. But he started getting all these weird symptoms – talking to himself, like I said, but back then it was also, like, these seizures that would shake the entire bed he was on – according to Mom; I didn’t see that – and he did that weird thing you get sometimes with brain damage where he suddenly spoke all these languages he didn’t know before. He kept not eating, and when he did, he kept puking it up. His parents…” she wrinkled her nose, as if smelling garbage. “They wanted to _institutionalize_ him. Can you believe that?”

           Aoife had gone ashen at the mention of an institution. <That’s _horrible. >_

            “I mean,” Jane struggled between honesty and the nervousness choking back her words, especially when Crys’ gaze settled on her. “It must have been…difficult, for them, you know…It’s horrible to think about, but…”

           “They’re _family,”_ Orla told her. “You don’t lock up your family, not unless they’re dangerous. And he wasn’t. Besides, they should have called for us – or Bob, I guess, since they live here in Derry. We could’ve done something. Or the SKS, for sure.”

            Aoife was glaring at Jane now. <There’s no excuse for putting someone in one of those places.>

           “But it’s like Orla said, what if he had been dangerous” – even as she spoke, Jane kicked herself inwardly for not shutting up. Why defend two humans she didn’t even know?

             “Jane, that’s not really what I said” – began Orla.

           <Well, you’re _neurotypical_ ; I wouldn’t expect _you_ to understand! > Aoife interrupted, snapping at Jane with a suddenness that nearly made her flinch.

            “ _Anyway_.” Crys’ voice carried a ring of finality that settled them. “He was in a bad place. They did have to hospitalize him for a bit. They did every test they could think of, but they never found anything.

              “And then one day, he just woke up…and it was all gone. He started eating and keeping food down again, started sleeping, no more acting weird, no more seizures…until his parents caught him talking to himself. But that was in May. That’s the only symptom that’s come back.” Crys shook her head. “I hate to say it, because Tim is great, but it’s kind of cool, almost. If you’re into medical stuff.”

             “Which I _am!”_ Orla fairly crowed. “Seriously, if I didn’t think teaching would be so cool, I’d go pre-med when I get to college. In fact, Crys, can you ask your mom if I can help out at the clinic?”

           “Of course, yeah, if your parents are okay with it, which I’m sure they” –

            “They’re fine, I asked” –

            “Okay, great! Yeah, I was gonna say”…

            <But wait,> Aoife asked, repeating herself and looking a bit embarrassed about it after the two others turned toward her. <So…who are you worried about then? Before, when you said…>

              “Oh, right. I was just going to say his parents,” Crys explained. “Because they’re not taking it well and they don’t have a history of, you know, reacting proactively. So yeah.”

               <Oh, sorry. That makes sense.>

              “You don’t have to apologize for that, dude, it’s fine.”

             <I know, sorry – > Aoife began again, and then shook her head with a self-deprecating smile. <I mean… _thanks_. >

              “What are you drawing?” Jane asked Aoife, deciding she’d make one last attempt to smooth things over with the girl. Given how Aoife’s cheeks darkened, it was more probable she’d just embarrassed her; oh well, that might be fun, at least.

            Aoife looked down and moved to hide the console screen further from view against her chest. <Nothing. It’s not very good.> As if under the same impulse to patch things up, she glanced at Jane’s paper. <Oh, that’s very good. Good work.>

              She sounded (so to speak) as stilted as Jane felt, but Jane decided to take the peace offering anyway. “Thank you.”

               “What is it, Aoife?” Crys craned her neck to look now, but she wasn’t trying very hard, clearly not wanting to overstep. “I bet it’s fan art,” she teased, but gently. “I bet it’s nudes.”

              Aoife looked ready to object, but then she grinned; a little forced at first, but then it slowly naturalized, a bit like a shoot putting forth new leaves. <Oh, yes. It’s definitely going to be nude fan art. It’s penises everywhere for sure.> They laughed about that and went back to their drawings soon enough; as Aoife set her console back down on the table, Jane did see a flash of a rounded, tan-colored shape that had the suggestion of a naked body. Then Aoife moved her arm to block it, and Jane bent over her own work so as not to be caught looking.

* * *

 

Aoife had her first therapy session with Dr. Lecter the Friday of the week that school started again. For some reason, school started back up on a Wednesday, which didn’t make much sense at all to Annie. She couldn’t remember whether they’d done that back when she was in grade school. Maybe the thinking was that a three-day-week would ease everyone back into the school routine?

She had just sent Aoife back to see Hannibal when the bell on the office’s front door rang again. That was surprising; Aoife was the last client for either of them that day. Annie looked up at the man, perhaps in his late thirties or early forties and dressed in a rather bad suit, who was walking up to her desk. He had the look of a revivalist about him, but Annie had no actual problem with them; it was only a bit unusual, up here.

“Can I help you, sir?” she asked with a friendly smile, trying hard to ignore the stab of anxiety at talking to a new face in town.

“Yes, Miss,” he said with a smile, and Annie forced herself not to giggle or do anything else humiliating. “In fact, you can. I’m looking for a Miss Annie Wilkes and a Doctor Hannibal Lecter?”

“That’s us,” Annie said quickly. “I mean, I’m she. Dr. Lecter is in with a patient – a client right now, but I can help you.”

“Ah, thank you…” he looked around at the cubbyholish office. “So you double-task as a receptionist too, huh?”

“I do,” Annie admitted. “I don’t mind it. And I’m not the psychiatrist, after all.” As proud as she was of going back to school and getting the social work degree, secretly Annie had no problem with receptionist work while she was between clients, even beyond the emotional toll that Tim Johnson’s case had begun to take on both Lecter and herself. She was fascinated by the mind and the body, but she could take or leave caring for people in distress. She seemed to have to ration her emotional capacity for all that very carefully.

“The doctor outranks you, huh?” he joked, and Annie had to laugh.

“That seems to be my fate,” she remarked. To clarify, she added, “I used to be a nurse.”

“Oh? My sister’s a nurse. What made you change careers?”

“Uh…several things,” Annie said truthfully. “The hours are long, and the work can be…well…”

“That’s true. I’ve heard some emergency room stories…” Annie wondered briefly if he was going to ask her whether she’d ever pulled a foreign object out of someone’s rear, but he didn’t.

“Anyway, I work for myself here,” she continued. “It’s a bit of a practice sort of arrangement. We’re some of the only mental health services outside the hospital in Derry, and we treat people who don’t like emergency rooms or psych wards.”

“Sounds good,” he agreed. “Actually, that’s what I’m here about – speaking of which, did I ever introduce myself?”

“I don’t think you did,” Annie admitted with a smaller, more genuine laugh. “That’s all right.”

He put out a hand for her to shake. “Albion Freeman.”

“That’s an interesting name.” Annie kicked herself. She’d meant it, and in a complimentary way, but it probably came off sounding like an insult.

“Thank you. It’s from West Virginia,” he said.

“You’re far from home. Are you moving up here?”

“I might be,” he said. “I saw there isn’t much of a church here. The one in town and over in Derry are both grown over with weeds and abandoned. That’s a strange thing.”

Annie felt a shiver on her neck. “It isn’t really. People’ve been moving out of Derry for a few decades now, since the plants closed down, and over in Salem’s Lot – Jerusalem’s Lot, that is – most people go to Saint Olaf’s, up the road a little ways, close to the woods. I do too, in fact.”

“You don’t seem like the Greek Orthodox type,” he laughed.

“They’re more Romanian and Eastern than Greek, but it’s an inclusive place,” Annie said, hoping she didn’t seem defensive. “Why wouldn’t I go? I mean, why wouldn’t anyone?”

“That’s just fine,” he laughed. “Don’t worry. I only ask because I thought maybe this area could use something more protestant. Non-denominational, maybe? I’m a Baptist by training, but I could do that, I think. I don’t know Catholicism or Mormonism or Eastern Orthodox, but I can do most of the others. I’ve been an itinerant, but I could settle down here. This place has a magic to it, doesn’t it?”

Annie willed herself to relax. He was a perfectly good Christian man who was thinking about building his own church. Maybe he had some dark past and had heard of the SKS, come here to join. “It does,” she agreed. “It’s beautiful. So what brings you up here? Before you learned about all our closed-down churches, I mean.”

“That’s what I came in here for,” he explained. “The Johnsons in Derry called me. They found me…online, I believe. They talked to me about their son.”

“Tim?” Annie’s brow puckered. “Are you a counselor, too?”

“Not exactly. They’re worried, and apparently…well, they want some spiritual input into his treatment.” Albion held up his hands. “I don’t want to step on anybody’s toes. You all have a job to do, and I don’t doubt you’re much more qualified for it than I am. But I want to respect the family’s wishes, so I thought I’d come see you as a courtesy, and to ask if there was anything you could tell me.”

Annie sat back. The word – the idea – _possession_ hung in the air between them, and she didn’t completely doubt it at this point, not after everything they’d seen and tried. Besides, sometimes things worked if you could just convince the patient you’d done something; at very least, couldn’t a blessing or an exorcism do some good like that? Still…

“I’m afraid I can’t legally give out any information without a waiver from his parents,” she said cautiously.

“I know; I’ve got it.” He took out the rumpled sheet of paper and handed it to her. “I can wait for your associate. Or I can come back another time when both of you’re available…”

“That might be best,” Annie agreed, feeling a need to process the whole encounter. “Do you have a card?”

“Not exactly, but here. May I?” he scribbled his email and his apparent phone number on a post-it and handed it to her with a friendly smile. “In case you’d like to get in touch, Miss Wilkes.”

Annie took the post-it, hoping she didn’t have anything in her teeth as she smiled back. She could be misreading the signs; she probably was – but no, she didn’t look like a matronly forty-odd-year-old spinster built like a football player anymore; she could look like anything she wanted, and she’d chosen herself at thirty, and several pounds lighter. “Thank you so much, Mr. Freeman. We’ll certainly give you a call.”

“I hope to hear from you soon,” he said with a wink.

* * *

 

 

_(From a duplicate of recording from the files of Dr. Hannibal Lecter in connection with the patient Her Imperial Highness Aoife Palpatine, to be sent to her Imperial Majesty Empress Tara Palpatine)_

_****_

“Do you mind if I record this session?”

<No, it’s all right.>

“I’ll also be sending your mother reports on our progress.”

<I remember about the waiver. It’s fine.>

“What shall I call you?”

<Whatever you’d be most comfortable with, Doctor.>

“These sessions are about your comfort, Princess, not mine.”

<“Aoife” is fine.>

“Aoife, then. Can you explain for me why you think you’re here?”

<Because my mother arranged it.>

“You wouldn’t be here otherwise?”

<By definition. I wouldn’t have an appointment, otherwise.>

“Would you have made one for yourself?”

<Probably not. No offense.>

“I told you, Aoife: these sessions are to be focused on your comfort, and your feelings.”

<I realize that, but I can feel yours, and they bleed into mine.>

_\-- (Doctor Lecter is silent for a while) --_

“Why wouldn’t you seek an appointment on your own?”

<I would be too busy with school and everything. I would forget.>

“If you did not forget?”

<I don’t believe talk therapy will help me. I’ve already had it.>

“What was the outcome?”

<Nothing. I have to confess, I distrust healthcare professionals in general.>

“Why is that?”

<Ask my mother.>

_\-- (Another long silence.) --_

“Can you at least tell me about your emotional state, overall?”

<It’s some form of depression, I think. I guess the best word for it is “horror.”>

“And what are you horrified at?”

<My body. The universe. Insert pretentious, ‘emo’ thing for me to be depressed about here, I suppose. It’s very clichéd.>

“Just between the two of us, I believe we can allow for some cliché. What is it about your body that horrifies you?”

<Mom didn’t tell you, did she?>

“No, I don’t believe she did. What should she have told me?”

<I got a new diagnosis. I had lesions on my spine and brain all summer, until they went in and fixed them. But the doctor says they can come back at any time.>

“That’s an excellent reason for body horror. Have you talked with your doctors about steps you can take to improve your prognosis?”

<Yes. I’m on medication. And Mom sends me information every chance she gets. I know what I need to do.>

“You seem unassured.”

<I am.>

_\-- (Silence.) --_

“What else makes you horrified?”

<Death.>

“That makes sense. Mortality is a natural fear, and you are at an age when it begins to sink in.”

<Why?>

“Pardon?”

<Why is it a natural fear? If we have to die, why does it scare us? If other people have to die, why does the loss have to hurt?>

“As an evolutionary disincentive from allowing ourselves to be killed, I would think. There are different opinions, of course” –

<Why does the universe work that way? Why should it?>

“I don’t know. Is there anything in particular causing you to think of death? Your new condition?”

<Ask my mother.>

_\-- (Silence.) --_

“Very well. Speaking of your mother, one thing she seemed concerned about when we spoke was how you would adjust to the change of coming here.”

<You know, I thought I would be more shaken up about it than I am.>

“Why do you think that might be?”

<It just doesn’t seem like as big of a deal since…you know, last summer. Did I already tell you about what happened? My diagnosis, and the attack?>

“Yes, you have.”

<Sorry. I sometimes forget who I’ve told and who I haven’t. But I think since then, everything else hasn’t felt very important. Or maybe I’m just desensitized at this point, ha…no, but seriously, it almost felt sort of… _right. >_

“How so?”

<Well, I guess…everything is different now, so _everything_ should be different. Including where I am. A clean break.>

“Of course. Now…your mother also confessed her worry that she was pressuring you too much into a position as Imperial heir.”

(The sound of Aoife’s clothes moving as she shifts; chair creaks)

< _She_ isn’t the one who puts too much pressure on me. And it’s a hell of a time for her to be worried about my anxiety level, anyway. >

“Would you like to elaborate more on that?”

<Not really.>

“Very well…What would you do if you couldn’t be empress?”

<Die, probably.>

“What would you do if you were _not going_ to be empress?”

<There’s nothing else I _can_ do. It’s what I was born for. >

“Could you not fill some other leadership position?”

<No. I don’t believe anyone would hire or elect me. I’m not a popular person.>

“You’re a very intelligent, talented young woman. Surely there is something else you could do.”

<Thank you, Doctor, but I know how this narrative is. I’m not being pushed into this. Mom isn’t pressuring me. If I didn’t want to, my family… _most_ of my family, and my Master, would stand by me. This is what I was meant to do. >

“Then may I simply give you a homework assignment for our next session?”

<I guess.>

“Do something that does not involve politics, or your plans. Do something that is completely separate from them, which represents who you are. Something you want to do. For no one but you and I. No one else will see it.”


	4. Chapter 4

           There was a knock on the door of Derry High’s biggest janitorial closet, the one Freddy usually thought of as his “office.” He’d hauled an extra desk and swivel chair in there, as well as some of the set furniture from behind the auditorium stage, and was thinking about putting in a little fridge, if he could get it, to store some beers in or something.

           He’d been reading a school copy of _The Catcher in the Rye_ that he’d pilfered from one of the supply closets, and couldn’t decide whether he liked it or not. It was kind of dense, or seemed so to him, at least (it wasn’t like he did a lot of reading on a regular basis, anyway), and there were parts he understood and parts he didn’t. The stuff about “phonies” made sense; that seemed pretty much true to life. He didn’t get the parts where Holden (what the hell kind of a name was “Holden Caulfield” anyway?) started worrying about little kids seeing graffiti or whatever. Freddy would never have said it, because he would never admit to reading a book in the first place, would never talk about his feelings on it, and wasn’t exactly sure how to anyway, but it seemed to him that Holden’s ideals and fears were tangling him up and tripping him, like snakes slithering around his legs. Or something.

           Now, he folded down the page-corner and hid the book in one of the desk-drawers, before opening the door, not barking at whoever it was, in case it was the principal. Instead, he looked down slightly into the face of Aoife Palpatine.

            “Shouldn’t you be in class?” he growled.

           Aoife shrank back slightly from the sharpness in his tone. <Could I talk to you in private for a second?>

            The solemnity in her tone rubbed Freddy the wrong way; it sounded Annie-like. “Uh…yeah.” He let her shoulder past him, her backpack bumping him, into the closet.

            “What do you want?” he asked now.

           Aoife looked as if she was seriously reconsidering this decision, but she kept going. <Um…I was wondering…> she swallowed. <Would you maybe want to have sex with me?>

            For a second, Freddy didn’t even think he’d heard her right. “ _What?”_

           Aoife was red in the face now. She closed her eyes. <I asked if you’d be interested in having sex with me.>

          Freddy stared at her. “Is this your idea of a fucking _joke?”_

         <No.> She looked down, and despite his own confusion and embarrassment, Freddy could tell that, for whatever goddamn reason, she was serious.

         “ _Why?”_ he asked. There were a lot of questions, but that was the biggie.

         By now, Aoife looked as though she wished the floor would open up and swallow her, but she kept talking. <Because…um…well, because, to be totally honest…> She looked up into his face like she was forcing herself to do it. The rational part of his brain suspected that that was because she was embarrassed. The irrational part was growling that she had noticed once again how ugly he was. Both parts of his brain were ready to kill something.

           <Because,> said Aoife, <To be totally honest, Mr. Krueger, I’m tired of being a virgin. I’m sexually frustrated, and I just don’t see myself as the “virgin” type. And I thought you might be interested because you probably don’t get a lot of opportunities like this. Consensual ones, at least.> She paused. <And you could also hurt me a little, if you wanted. Give me shallow cuts on parts of my body that I can easily cover, that sort of thing.>

           “Why me?” Freddy took a step toward her. “Seriously, why me?”

           Aoife’s face had passed beyond nervousness and humiliation, and had grown hard. <Because I couldn’t think of anyone else who might be desperate and perverted enough to get off on hurting and fucking a fat, ugly teenage girl with special needs.>

          “And what’s stopping me from doing whatever the fuck I want with you and then permanently shutting you up?” He took another step forward. “You ain’t a princess out here.”

         <Maybe not, but you’ll have to contend with my Master.> Aoife smiled coldly. <Which means contending with all the forces of Hell, pretty much. You’re wanted down there, right?> She wrapped her scarf tighter around her neck with a weird primness. <But I can see I wasted my time.>

            “Yeah. You fucking did. Now get the hell out.”

           <Oh, I’m going.> She turned back halfway out the door. <Enjoy your dreamstalking tonight, and your _hand_ ,> she managed over her shoulder, her voice breaking only slightly, but it was music to Freddy’s ears all the same.

* * *

 

_(From a duplicate of recording from the files of Dr. Hannibal Lecter in connection with the patient Her Imperial Highness Aoife Palpatine, to be sent to her Imperial Majesty Empress Tara Palpatine)_

 

“Do you remember the assignment I gave you toward the end of our last session?”

<Yes, Doctor.>

“Were you able to attempt it?”

<I think so. I…made something.>

 _\--(Aoife takes a folder out of her school bag and opens it. At the back of the folder, hidden behind other papers, is a colorful printout of a digital painting_. _Aoife pulls this out and hands it to Doctor Lecter.) –_

“Tell me about your picture.”

<I made it on the digital paint program of my console.>

“And it is…your body…this is you?”

<Yes.>

“I thought so. What does this mean?”

<The pose?>

“Yes. You are laying back with your eyes closed, your facial expression appearing serene. Your abdomen has been hollowed out neatly, and the abscess filled with bunches of flowers.”

<Um…yes.>

“Can you explain why you chose this particular image to show me?”

<It felt…right.>

“Did you fantasize about the mutilation aspect?”

<Not really. I think I was already dead, in the painting, when it was done.>

“So someone crafted your body into this without you inside it, so to speak.”

<Yes, I suppose so.>

“Aoife, could we speak frankly?”

_\--(Silence.)--_

“Aoife?”

<…Yes, of course.>

“Were you inspired by what you know of my life before I came to this area? By the Chesapeake Ripper’s crimes?”

<Yes, Doctor. A bit.>

“Did you create this to see what my reaction would be?”

<N…I don’t know… I don’t think so.>

“Do you want this done to you?”

<No, not in real life.>

“But the idea of being converted into an object and a sculpture – an inanimate work of art – is appealing to you in the abstract.”

<In a fantasy, yes.>

“It’s much easier to be an object than a conscious being, isn’t it?”

<Yes, it is.>

“Aoife, I would like you to consider allowing me to prescribe you a low dose of a mild antidepressant.”

<Doctor, I don’t think that’s possible.>

“Why is that?”

<If the Imperial Senate knew I was taking drugs of that nature, my ability to succeed my mother would be called into question. Well… _further_ called into question. >

“I think I understand. But consider that without some form of treatment, you may be unable to complete your duties anyway.”

 

_\--(End of recording)--_

* * *

 

Even as the sun set, the dry desert heat remained, only just starting to be broken up by breezes. Looking out the bus window as they barreled toward Austin, Orla couldn’t help but be amazed by the sight of the great expanse of land that opened around them on either side. She thought maybe she could see dunes or rocks on the very far edge of the horizon before the night came on fully, but otherwise there seemed to be nothingness for miles – well, emptiness for miles. There was not _nothing_ ; she could feel beings – potential ideas – spirits – out there on the land, waiting for someone to find them. Or, perhaps, existing in the safe knowledge that no one would ever cross the sand and stones to find them. She’d thought she knew wide-open space back in Maine, but at least there, there had been trees and mountains in the way. Here, the sky stared down at you. It had nowhere else to look.

For the umpteenth time, she looked down at her ring finger, where she had finally decided to start wearing Barlow’s engagement ring. It was a family heirloom, and looked it: dark gold, set with a tiny copy of his family’s crest, presumably, inset in red and blue gems, or maybe they were just glass. Especially in the darkened bus, it was too small for her to make out the actual symbols or letters. It was a pretty-enough ring; she didn’t care that it wasn’t a diamond, or maybe not even set with real jewels at all. That would be shallow, she told herself.

She was having second thoughts, but that was natural, and she’d known she would. It wasn’t like this was set in stone; they weren’t married yet, and anyway you were allowed to divorce in traditional marriages, especially during the first three years.

_You’re leading him on. You’re not fully intending to go through with this._

_He only wants me because I’m young and virginal and maybe kind of pretty_ , Orla argued with herself. _I’m not the only one being shallow and flaky_.

_Anyway, an actual nobleman from the Old Country wants me to be his pretty young trophy wife. It’s flattering._

_He’s treating me like an actual, desirable girl. And not just a fetish, either, a respectable girl who’s worth stuff like…like marriage proposals and awkward meetings with my parents._

She sighed, checked to make sure the ring hadn’t slipped off her finger yet again, and tried to settle back into her MP3. At least they were going to see Christian experimental metal bands; at least it wasn’t going to be boring whitebread SBC bullshit. Maybe she and Crys could even pick up a few tricks for _VDPM_.

 

Orla had worked stage crew at the school play last year, and she’d thought she knew her way around backstage, but these labyrinthine corridors, dimly lit with peeling maroon-red walls, were a complete closed book to her. She was looking for the bathroom. At least, that was what she was planning to say if anyone stopped her.

Something hit the wall with a crash as she walked past a fire exit; Orla hugged the wall until the outside noises – sounds of conflict, it almost seemed like – died down. Then, with extreme caution (not only for safety but also because it might trigger a fire alarm), she pushed the door open slowly.

A figure dressed – despite the Texas heat – in a long black coat was lying slumped against the wall. The air smelled like a bonfire, and brimstone. Parts of the pavement were on fire, and the flaming parts were shaped like…motorcycle tire tracks?

Warily, Orla leaned over the figure in the coat. It looked like a young man, older – well, more physically developed, anyway; apparent age got weird where vampires were concerned, Orla knew – than she was, with extraordinarily pale skin, almost faintly bluish, and thick black hair.

His eyes opened slowly. _“Curse you, Ghost Rider – you win this round, but I’ll be”_ – he trailed off, and peered suspiciously up at her. “Who are _you?”_

Orla swallowed, throat dry. It occurred to her that this man might be dangerous. “I’m…I’m Orla. Orla McAshton. I, um, I’m in town for the, for the concert. I live, um, up North. Um, are you okay?”

He regarded her for a moment. “Uh…thanks for your concern,” he said at last, looking slightly off-balance. “But I doubt you know any first aid that would do a being like me any good.”

“I’ve known spiritual beings and nonhumans before, and I’m a vampire myself. I’ve had some Craft training. I might be able to help.”

“Oh.” He looked taken aback. “Well…I’m all right,” he reassured her awkwardly. “I’ve had far worse. I suppose I could use some blood, and a place to rest awhile.” His eyes rested on her cross pendant. “And don’t let that touch my skin, please.”

“Oh, right. I’m sorry.” Orla took the pendant and slid it around on its chain so that it hung down her back. “I didn’t even think of it. Is that better?”

“Er…much.” He gazed up at her again. “ _Do_ you perhaps have any blood?”

“We have Tru-Blood back at the hotel room. Come on, I’ll take you there.”

 

“Better?” Orla asked. She’d called Crys, who would hopefully let the group leader know where she was and why she’d left the theater. She’d made the young man comfortable on one of the beds, his coat draped over a chair and his shoes off, and given him a bottle of Tru-Blood.

“Yes. Very,” he said, a little warily. He kept staring at her. “Er…thank you for doing this. People don’t, very often. Especially…” he stopped himself and didn’t finish.

“It’s okay.” Orla shifted; his gaze was making her blush. Her self-consciousness wasn’t helped by the fact that he was actually pretty handsome. For one of the first times in her life, she wished she’d worn something with a lower neckline. “Would you, um, like something to do? There’s TV, of course. I don’t like that very much. People think I’m weird.”

He gave a small smile. “You aren’t ‘weird’ for that.”

“Oh. Um, well, thanks.” Orla struggled not to flap her hands a bit or mess around with her hair. “The only thing I watch is _Doctor Who_. Well, sometimes _Star Treks_ , if they’re on. I do like DS9. Um, _Deep Space Nine_ , I mean. Well, actually...” she trailed off, stopping herself. She also watched _Steven Universe_ , but it occurred to her that mature young women weren’t supposed to like kids’ cartoons.

“What is that? The first one you mentioned.”

“It’s…well, it’s about this alien, but he travels through time as well as space, and he takes humans around in his ship with him, and they have adventures, and sometimes there are good messages...”

“Why does he take _humans_ with him?”

“Well…he’s the last of his race. Everyone he knew is dead. His entire planet, and everything. He’s lonely.”

There was a long silence, and then the young man said, “That…sounds interesting.”

“It is.” Orla forced herself to speak again. “But it won’t be on now. I don’t think any of it will. I don’t know any of the channels here, anyway. I brought a lot of books, though. You can read any one you want.” She got out her books to show him.

She was unprepared for how adorable he looked as he stared down at the books set out before him on the bed – his face was that of a child in a candy store, or a hungry person at a miraculous feast. “I...” He looked up at her, happily and with another look she couldn’t interpret. “I’m not familiar with any of these titles…which do _you_ recommend?” he asked, now smiling up at her solicitously. Orla felt that smile doing… _things_ to her.

“This one is funny,” she said, picking up _The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy_. “Would you…um…like me to read it to you?”

His brow puckered indignantly. “I can _read!”_

Orla’s blood ran cold. “Oh, I know. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to sound like I didn’t think you could read. I just wondered maybe, if you were tired, or if your head still hurt”-

“Oh.” He went pink. “Of course. That’s…that’s kind of you. I…I am sorry. Yes, thank you, I would like that.”

 

They both jerked at the knock on the door. “I should go,” the young man murmured. He looked up at Orla. “May I…see you again?”

“Um…” Orla tried to think despite the insistent knocking. “Here.” She grabbed one of her notebooks, scribbled down her address and phone number on the page, tore it out, and folded it into his coat. “That’s my phone number, and where I live. Just ask for me. _JUST A SECOND!”_ she yelled in the direction of the door, louder than she’d meant to. “But…who are you?” Had he ever even told her his name?

He hesitated. “It’s…well…I’m ‘Blackheart.’” He looked defensive. “My mother named me. She’s insane. She said it came to her in a vision or something. My father liked it because he’s crazy, too.”

Orla wasn’t fully comfortable hearing him talk about his parents that way, but it occurred to her that unfortunately, some people did have truly fucked-up home lives. “I like it,” she lied.

He gave her the smile of someone who doesn’t smile very often, but whose body is giving him no choice in the matter. “Goodbye, Orla McAshton.” He looked as if he was trying to seem suave. “I hope to see you again very soon.” And he disappeared in a mist just before Crys Wilkes unlocked the door.

* * *

          The more Freddy turned over the interaction with Aoife in his mind, the angrier he got. He couldn’t exactly put his finger on why. After all, it wasn’t every day that barely-legal teenage girls came offering you their virginity. He should’ve taken her up on it. He should’ve at least been flattered or turned on.

          Except it wasn’t like that. Because it wasn’t like she was attracted to him, as a “Horror Icon” at least (that was all he expected; he’d looked in the mirror, he knew he was no Fabio, he wasn’t expecting any girls to get soaking wet over his face or body). Her attraction had nothing to do with him. In fact, Freddy wasn’t sure there _was_ any attraction.

           Maybe that was it. Maybe it was just that she’d been so transparently looking for some dick to shove up her pussy, and she didn’t care whose it was. His was just…convenient. With the added benefits that he was a known pervert and would therefore have no standards, and that if it all went to hell, she could always claim he’d been his usual self and forced it on her.

          He growled as he shifted gear and drove faster down the dark mountain road. He hated feeling like this; helpless and bitchy for no reason and like some kind of chick on the rag. He wanted to kill something. Someone. A brat.

          Maybe he could leave the boundaries of Reality X and hijack some brat’s dream. It wouldn’t take long to get in and out, and he could always make it look like an accident. Somewhere miles downstate from here, maybe, where nobody knew him, or only knew him as an action figure or a dark “the best time to wear a striped sweater” joke.

         Bob would still know.

          Freddy snarled again and pushed the whip faster, half-hoping the car would crash itself. It wasn’t like it was real. It wasn’t like it would do any serious damage to anything. None of him was real anymore. None of him did any damage. _Impotent_ , said a voice in his head.

         It was a relief when he rammed the tree, since it gave him an opportunity to shake out of the thought spiral. _Crys is going off to college soon. She still needs tuition. Not to mention this gender confusion thing. She needs you around and not getting kicked out of the SKS or the area over angsty-bitchy PMS bullshit about some teenage girl wanting your dick for the wrong reasons. As if there even is a “wrong reason” for a teenage girl to want you._

         Freddy fished in the glove compartment for a bottle as the smoke from the crash dissipated into the humid summer evening air, and as he drank, staring out the window more or less mindlessly, it came to him that the house he’d stopped in front of looked familiar.

          After a few moments of thought, it came to him.

          Freddy put the bottle back in the compartment, a slow grin spreading over his face like an oil slick.

 

         There was no harm in dream-stalking Tim Johnson a little bit, he told himself as he stepped into the brat’s dreams.

         For one thing, he wouldn’t kill Tim. Obviously. Whenever anybody died in their sleep around here, the obvious suspect was Freddy, despite all the fucking vampires and god knew what else that lived up the mountain. Always Freddy’s fault. Of course it was. Not that it was _bad_ to have a reputation as a sadistic killer still intact, but not so that you got blamed for shit you didn’t do…

         But anyway, if the kid woke up with a few harmless cuts or scratches, well, who was to say he hadn’t done it to himself? Or those creepy parents of his. This was fucking Derry, after all. If a kid lived here and wasn’t getting low-level traumatized on a regular basis, that kid was probably the one doing the traumatizing.

        And from what he could tell, even if the kid realized who was starring in his nightmares, it wasn’t like he was in any shape to accuse Freddy. Assuming Bob would even consider this out of bounds. After all, Freddy wasn’t killing anyone.

        He entered the dream.

 

         It was one of the high mountaintop fields you found sometimes, a little shelf of meadow at the top of a rugged breakneck trail of switchbacks. The meadow extended to the visible horizon, but then stopped with the kind of abruptness that suggested a sheer drop-off. In the distance, nearly hidden by clouds and what morning-mist still remained, it was just possible to make out other mountaintops.

          It was almost impossibly bright, but the light didn’t translate into heat, and the air stayed chilly and smelling slightly of dew and of the grass. A breeze stirred across the scene, ruffling the grasses and sending individual clover-heads bobbing.

           The stillness was amazing. There was the sound of wind – the beating of the breeze in the ears, and the faint rushing of wind between the mountains farther below. But it was muted, and the kind of sound that seemed most like an extension of silence, almost white noise but not even loud enough to be that.

           The air was Maine air, even in this dream. It smelled like the morning, like dew, and like the ocean. When you breathed it in, you felt it sweeping through your lungs, filling them up and chilling them just a little.

           The dream was immersive, like a memory plus the embellishments of time, and at first even Freddy was almost content just to sit in the grass, getting his bearings and looking around at the scene. He even felt a little rage dissipate slightly in the calm, quiet place. _Not a bad dream, Timmy. Not bad at all_.

           He stood and turned around slowly, and saw them almost by the edge of the field, a few hundred feet away. They both looked dark-skinned, and their bodies contrasted with the bright washed-out greens and blues of the grass and sky. _Two girls_ , he thought. As he started to get closer, he saw them better: one had short, curly hair of a dark brown color, and olive skin. Something about her looked familiar, but he couldn’t put his finger on what. The other girl, Freddy was sure he hadn’t seen around before; she was looking at him, though. She was wearing some red, richly-beaded, silky thing that fluttered in the breeze and didn’t seem to jive with her strong, athletic build and her guarded look as she tracked his movements. He didn’t get the impression that she was scared of him, despite him wearing the glove in full view of them both, as he came toward them. It was more the kind of look you might see on a fighter in the ring, sizing up an opponent before coming at them. Her dark hair was cropped short on her head and coiled into snake-like black braids, which clung to her ochre-colored scalp. Out of the way, Freddy noticed, where an enemy couldn’t grab them.

          Her eyes were yellow and catlike. They didn’t blink or leave Freddy’s body as she stood slowly, walking toward him now through the tall grass, festive dress billowing, each movement self-assured and deadly effective. There was something militant about her; disciplined and well-trained.

         Freddy filled his lungs with the Maine mountain air again, his own breathing inadvertently speeding up (old habits died hard) as he waited to see what she’d do. He wasn’t completely convinced that he could beat the girl, not in a dream like this that was so obviously her turf, and him as out of practice and soul-withdrawn as he was. But that only seemed to add to the thrill; it was something dangerous and primal and sensual, the urge to rip and tear and cause _pain_ that he knew she was feeling, too. It stretched out between them like a rubber band ready to snap.

         Then the girl spoke.

         “Get out of here,” she ordered Freddy.

         He nearly laughed at the idea, after all that buildup, of this kid expecting him to just go away because she told him to. _You’re not the boss of me. Time for you to learn, bitch…_

         “Let’s go,” said the girl, over her shoulder, to her companion. Freddy, still in mid-spring, found himself thrown as she stalked back over to her friend and took her hand.

          The sun hid behind a cloud and the sky went dark as they disappeared. Tim was waking up, Freddy realized; as the air froze and behind him, the mountain started to rumble.

 

           _Okay, but who were they?_ Freddy still didn’t know. Tim Johnson’s mother, maybe? Could be, although he’d eat his hat if that yellow-eyed bitch was anyone’s mother, at least anyone human. _But I could’ve sworn it was Tim Johnson’s dream_. Maybe Tim just dreamed about pretty girls on mountains. Still, the whole thing felt strange. A welcome distraction from the Aoife thing, though, Freddy reflected as he turned the car toward the Lonely.

* * *

 

Freddy took to watching the little princess, out of the same combination of boredom and lust that led him to watch most of the high schoolers in the area. He didn’t do anything about it – well, sometimes he popped up in a nightmare or fever dream of theirs, but nothing ever came of it – largely for the same reason that he’d once heard of recovering smokers keeping a cigarette in their pockets. The little reminder that they could quit on quitting at any time. Just in case.

One night, he caught her touching herself. She was scrolling down something on her computer tablet thing, he couldn’t make out much except a long page of text, looking like a story. He watched her hand slip down between her legs once or twice before she gave herself to it, rolling onto her stomach and curling in on herself, eyes closing as she rubbed. He found himself wondering what she was thinking about.

 

          He was still thinking about that – not in a rapture, but idly, the way you might think about a particularly good porno you’d seen recently – when Annie called.

The first thing he heard was her sniveling, and groaned inwardly. “What’s up, Annie?”

“Aoife’s gone,” she managed. “She’s disappeared.”

 

          “Do you have any clue where she could’ve gone?” Freddy demanded as soon as he stalked in the door.

          “She’s got Kanner’s,” Arianrod pointed out, from where she sat beside Annie, trying to get her to drink a mug of tea. “’Classic’ autism,” she added for Freddy’s benefit. “The one people think of when they think of autism. But what I mean is, maybe she wanders.”

          “ _You_ don’t wander,” Annie pointed out, emerging from her almost catatonic silence.

          “Yeah, but her autism is different from mine. I’ve got Asperger’s.” Arianrod shrugged.

          “Hey, that reminds me, we watched this horror featurette thing on TV last night,” Crys piped up. “About that guy in the wheelchair in _Friday the 13 th_ who Jason Voorhees kills” –

           She trailed off at Freddy’s face. For his part, Freddy’s hands were already balling themselves into fists. _Motherfucking Jason_.

           “But why would she” – Arianrod trailed off as the realization hit her. “She wouldn’t try to do _that_ , would she?”

           _It’s always the quiet ones, sweetheart_. Freddy was already grabbing for his glove. “I’ll get her back.” If anyone was going to face off with Voorhees tonight, it was going to be him.

 

         Driving down through the now-dark woods, he sent his mind on ahead, searching for hers. He’d be able to feel her mind anywhere at this point, he thought. He knew the shape of it well enough, even though there were some parts of it that she kept too deeply buried for someone like him to see.

 

         He didn’t know how long he’d been driving. Time didn’t make a lot of sense in this context, since he wasn’t moving through normal space (there was no point; this was more efficient). But he had the feeling he’d gone a long way, and was far away from Salem’s Lot. The woods outside didn’t look too familiar.

         He could feel her close.

         _She’s afraid._

 

         He pulled up at Crystal Lake, and it didn’t surprise him at all that she’d be there, after all. Aoife seemed like the kind of person who did dangerous things, out of some inner drive to test her luck. Or to punish herself. Or maybe to prove to herself that she could.

            A scream rang out in the moist night air, previously broken only by the sounds of peeper frogs, not yet asleep for the season, and then the night rolled back in.

           Freddy turned in the direction of the scream, over too quickly to identify, and ran.

 

           The action was already over when he got to her.

           He entered the cabin prepared for the scene – the door wrenched off its hinges, the furniture overturned – and he prepared himself for the sight of Aoife, slumped against the wall or maybe laid on the floor with surprising gentleness, drenched in red and staring at nothing.

          He turned and looked at where the body was slumped. And he stared back at it.

          That was not Aoife Palpatine.

          Something stirred in the corner behind him, and he turned, and there was Aoife. She was soaked, covered in mud and blood – not hers – and curled up on herself protectively against the plywood-thin cabin wall, shivering in the cold, clammy air.

          Freddy looked back at the body of Jason Voorhees, and then down at Aoife. For a long time, he didn’t have anything to say, and then suddenly he did. “Come on, Princess. He’ll be back up again soon enough. We better not be here when he is.” He helped haul her up – she was stiff and shaking pretty bad, and her skin was like ice – and they staggered back to the Chevy together. He put her in the front seat, and materialized a blanket for her. To his mild surprise and frustration, she kicked it off; after a minute or two he realized the problem. It was too scratchy, probably. He made it softer, and sure enough, she relaxed inside it. He felt weirdly proud of himself for divining that.

          <Wait.> Freddy gave a slight jump to hear her voice in his mind for the first time that evening. <Just…wait.> She didn’t seem to be able to say more.

         A faint sound of metal smoothness hung in the air like the moonlight, and then out of the woods, from the direction of the cabin, came her walking stick, and floated itself into the car’s back seat, where it came to rest. It was lacquered black and ornate with silver filigrees; Freddy now realized that the fancy silver decorations were clasps. The staff contained her lightsaber hilt, he now saw, plus a concealed traditional sword with a non-laser blade. They screwed into each other in a somewhat ingenious way; he’d always had sort of an interest in putting shit together, which had come in handy with the knife-glove. It was kind of clever, when you thought about it – people saw her using a walking stick and assumed it was some kind of handicap-related thing, that it had to do with physical weakness, and never even considered the possibility that she was armed.

          Freddy started feeling calmer as they pulled away and out of the camp’s front gate, and since Aoife didn’t seem ready to start talking again, he switched on the radio.

_“I am a passenger_

_And I ride and I ride_

_I ride through the city’s backside_

_I see the stars come out of the sky_

_Yeah they’re bright in a hollow sky_

_You know it looks so good tonight…”_

          It occurred to him belatedly that the music might be making Aoife’s overstimulation – that was probably what it was; apparently that could happen sometimes with autism, according to Arianrod and Annie – worse than it already was. But when he glanced over, she looked more relaxed, even more lucid, than before.

 

         In the car, on that night, under the hollow sky, Aoife was movement.

         By the time they pulled up to the Lonely, just a few miles from home now, she was enjoying the music. Flapping. That was oddly okay with Freddy. He was used to watching Arianrod do it. But she did more than flap; her body strained against itself to dance in her seat, or just sink into the rhythm of the songs and move with them. It was similar to how she’d looked that one night he watched her touching herself. Straining at some kind of restraint, physical or psychological or both, for a release she knew was out there somewhere but which was hard to reach, like climbing a mountain.

Freddy shook his head silently to himself. He was the least psychologically-inclined person he knew (aside from Mikey; it was anyone’s guess what he thought about), and he was finding Aoife pretty interesting to observe; someone like Arianrod, Annie, or Hannibal would probably be able to write a whole paper on her. Then again, it might just be that other than Crys, he usually didn’t pay this much attention to a kid before striking.

         “Here.” He handed her the walking stick. “Figured you might be hungry.” She nodded gratefully as she climbed out of the car. The Lonely wasn’t what you’d call “accessible,” built on a small outcropping-hill-thing in the woods, and you could only reach it via stairs or by climbing up some rocks. He helped her on the stairs; her limbs were still apparently stiff.

          The Lonely was blessedly empty except for Sven, and Freddy led her to one of the back booths that had its own little niche in the stone wall. “What do you want to drink?” he asked.

          <Water is fine.> She shivered. <No ice, though, please.>

         Freddy nodded, and went to the bar. “Hey Sven, beer on tap and a water. No ice for either.”

         Sven’s look of perpetual good nature flickered with concern, probably for Aoife. “Sure, Fred.” Freddy could tell the bartender/manager was trying to frame properly the question, _are you about to kill or molest someone?_ He apparently settled for, “Um…is she okay?”

         Although considering that Aoife was covered in grime and gore, Freddy couldn’t actually fault him for asking that. “She’s okay. She’s just had a long night. Hey, call Annie’s cell and give her a message. Just tell Annie that I’ve found her – she’ll know who I mean – and we’ll be back in town soon.”

         Sven looked a hair relieved. “Uh, sure, Fred. Coming right up.”

 

         “We got some time,” Freddy told Aoife, sliding back into the booth. “I ordered you a burger, by the way, because you look like you’re about to keel over. Do you want to go clean off or anything?”

         She shook her head. <Maybe a little later.> She was still too beat and sore to do anything but lean against the seatback, he realized.

         “Then can we talk?” he asked. She nodded. “Okay. What the hell were you doing at the lake?”

        <It’s stupid. And you wouldn’t understand _._ >

        “Try me. I’ve got no love for Jason Voorhees, I’ll tell you that.”

         <He killed a boy in a wheelchair.>

         Freddy wouldn’t have considered himself intuitive. He didn’t think of applying those terms to himself at all. But he felt the change in her mood like some animals could feel a drop in air pressure before a storm, or something like that. This was some Annie-style shit right here, and as with Annie, his instincts were telling him _go slow here, and carefully._

         “Well,” he said as casually as he could. “I mean, that’s what slashers do. We go for teens. I mean, present company excepted of course. But you know what I mean. It wasn’t just because he was in a wheelchair, I’m sure. Hell, it probably would’ve been ‘ableist’ not to get a kid just because he was in a wheelchair, if you think about it.”

         <Well, he’s still one of…us. Or was, while he was alive. That matters. To me, anyway.> Sven brought their drinks, and she took a thirsty gulp of hers. <Besides, I saw a clip of it on the television. On a show where they were discussing the movies. And the commentators on the show were talking about how at the start they felt pity toward the boy, but then when he started having sex with a girl in the film, they joked about wanting him to die.>

          “Well…” Damn, he could actually see why that might bother someone sensitive, especially someone who had a disability themselves. “I mean, that’s another slasher thing. You kill the sluts and studs off first. It’s traditional.”

         <That’s not how it was. They made it sound like a disabled person sleeping with someone was even worse than a normal person doing it. As if there was something…obscene about it _. >_ She looked down and rubbed her forehead, shoulders slumping. <As if it was horrible that a person in a wheelchair had people who wanted to sleep with him, when _normal people_ like _them_ didn’t _._ >

         Freddy drank some of the beer. He realized he hadn’t asked what kind was on tap tonight, although frankly he wouldn’t have cared. “Well…yeah, I could see how that might be…upsetting,” he lied slightly, but it didn’t matter. She wasn’t really listening to him now.

         She glanced out the small window cut into the wall and set with thick, green glass panes. <It’s like that with autism. It’s worse here – on Earth, I mean – in some ways, because people actually know what it is. Everyone keeps comparing me to someone named “Temple Grandin.” Do you know about her?>

        “Do I ever.” Arianrod had used to complain about this very issue. She hadn’t ever shut up about it, in fact. She probably still complained about it, to her jock vampire of a husband now.

        <No one will ever see me as an actual adult.> She shook her head. <Not even when I actually am one. And I’m going to be a virgin forever, because no one will ever want me. Even if I met someone who did like… _bigger_ women, they still wouldn’t have sex with an autistic person. They would probably think it was perverted. > She shrugged. <Besides, my hair sucks.>

           “What’s wrong with your hair?” Freddy asked despite himself.

           <Well, it’s treated right now, so it looks all right. But if I don’t keep it treated, it gets all wiry and I can’t even comb it. I can barely do anything with it.> She frowned. <You probably don’t think it’s a big deal. I guess it’s not. But where I come from, for someone like me…like _us_ ; like my Mom and my sister and I…hair is a big deal. Especially on Naboo. But in the Capitol, too.> She took another sip of her water. <I mean, I just don’t have much of anything going for me, you know? Other than power, I guess, and guys don’t like that in girls anyway.>

              An awkward silence followed that, as Freddy remembered the proposition in his office, and he was willing to bet she was thinking about that, too. But he’d be damned if he’d bring that up. "Of course," he said instead, "The whole 'ableism' thing is kind of a tough rap to pin on Voorhees – I’m not defending him – I’m just saying...'cause, you know, he's disabled."

          Aoife raised her gaze to gape up at him. < _What? >_

          "Well...yeah. ‘Special needs.’ I mean, I'm not sure exactly what, like, his official diagnosis is, but it's some form of re- of _mentally challenged_."

           Aoife sat still for a moment, absorbing this. Then, she bent and laid her head on the table, facedown, in silent defeat.

           Freddy sat back, feeling awkward. "Aoife...aw, hell, Aoife. He's one of us. He'll be up and at 'em again in no time."

          <Maybe it was internalized ableism,> she said half-heartedly, as if to herself, without raising her head.

           “Sure. Could be.”

           < _Fuck. >_

           "He's gonna be fine, Aoife, I'm telling you."

             < _This is what they fucking do to us! >_ She raised her head and he felt her anger flaring. A few tables away, a glass salt shaker spontaneously exploded and shattered. <They pit us against each other...oh, we might be autistic but we're " _high-functioning_ "..."people with depression aren't _really_ disabled, it's all in their heads"..."we autistics aren't the _dangerous_ ones, it's those _mentally ill people_ "...>

             "Sounds like it's the normal people you and Voorhees and everyone should be ganging up on."

             <Ha. Maybe someday. No, I'm only joking.> But he caught her thoughtful look before she turned her head to try to peer out the tiny window into the dark.

 

           In the end, it was that little half-look of consideration that did it for him. The cool, serious consideration of his suggestion as an option. No nervous hesitation, no qualms or platitudes about “recovery” and “willpower.” In that moment, he could see her like the blades inside the cane of hers she was using at the moment. Underneath the decorative casing, the sleek, merciless decisiveness of the knife.

           Or of the laser-sword-thing, in this case. Whatever. Anyway, there was something highly attractive about the simplicity of her reaction.

So now, here they were, in her bedroom, with the lights out and keeping quiet so Annie wouldn’t hear.

           <Are you sure we shouldn’t do it in your lair?> she had asked, and Freddy was sorely tempted. But no, Annie might check up on Aoife, now that she was back and Annie’s initial fears were assuaged, and it was easier to duck under the bed than it was to transport Aoife back here at the drop of a hat.

           “How do you wanna do this?” he asked now, and noted her pensive look as she changed into a silky, gauzy nightgown that Freddy couldn’t believe Tara had bought for her daughter. “Where’d you get _that?”_

           <Wallis went with me to buy some things back home,> she said shortly. <She didn’t know why I wanted it. Though I guess maybe she suspects.> She looked up at him, blue eyes strangely aglow in the dim, moonlit bedroom. <How do _you_ want to do it? >

            “I don’t think you’d get a lot out of it if we did it that way, Princess.”

             <You’d be surprised.> She smiled faintly, a little coldly. <I think you’d probably like to hurt me however you could, and use me. I think you’d like me to be completely under your thumb and begging you for mercy.> She cocked her head. <Without getting too into specifics, am I generally right?>

              Freddy honestly had no response for that. He couldn’t help the stab of anger that had pierced his gut, or the naked feeling of her still looking at him. “So what?” he managed.

             <Even right now, you seem a little…freaked out, in terms of the Force,> she added unnecessarily. <I think you really want to teach me a lesson for talking to you like that. Right, Freddy?> Her cheeks colored slightly at the presumptuous use of his first name.

            “Get on with it.” He didn’t try to keep the snarl out of his voice this time.

           She nodded. <I don’t want you to kill me, honestly. And if you did that, you’d get in a lot of trouble. Which you know. But…I want you to hurt me. You can spank me or slap me around. You can cut me a bit. You can make it rough.> She shrugged, and Freddy could see the mask of confidence slip for a moment. But that might have been part of her game; draw him in and make him think she was a little bit vulnerable; able to be hurt. He was getting the idea that Aoife was a control freak about what part of her people could see.

            “It’s your first time,” he pointed out. “It’s gonna hurt even more.”

             <I know,> she said.

            A smile began to curl his lips.

           He tipped his hat jokingly, but didn’t take it off, or the glove. “Well, Princess, if that’s really what you want.”

           Raising the glove, he chased her back onto the bed, until he was leaning over her. “We aim to please.”

 


	5. Chapter 5

            It was a conscious decision.

            It could not have been a conscious decision, Aoife reflected later, in anyone else, or at least in most other people she had ever known. From a fairly early age, she had noticed that no one else around her, not even the most calculating of the politicians her mother dealt with, watched themselves the way she did. They had thoughts, and wants, and they could anticipate others’ actions and plan their own, but they did not seem to know the deep patterns underneath their own thoughts. They knew what they wanted and how to get it, and what others around them likely wanted, but they did not know _why_ they themselves wanted what they wanted.

            And Aoife always had. Even before she had learned about her grandmother’s Craft and her mother’s Earth books about witches and their Second Thoughts, Aoife had observed others from outside, and more, she had observed others while they were observing her. She had learned to remember her dreams. She had learned to remember even the slightest sensory memories from as far back as she could recall. She had learned to trace her own thoughts back through the web of cognitive associations, to find the root of the thoughts and inputs that had led her to her current mental state.

            Nothing happened in her own mind that Aoife Palpatine didn’t know about.

             No, that wasn’t true. It had used to be, but it wasn’t anymore.

_(Because I didn’t used to be going mad, and now I am.)_

             But this decision, this particular decision, had to be a conscious one. Aoife would not allow herself to make it unconsciously; she did not allow herself those indulgences.

             She lay in bed after Krueger was gone, and felt as though something should have changed inside her, or in her life. But nothing had. It was like looking out over the land, that morning, her first day here. There was potential, but she could not reach it. There was the sense of a great achievement within her grasp. All she needed to do was begin. But _how_ to begin?

 _What do you want?_ she asked herself.

            And it came to her that she wanted to possess someone. She wanted to be the one mistress, the one person who knew them as no one else did, who held them in a way beyond touch, beyond romance, beyond the way anyone else could. She wanted to be _necessary_ to someone. A sort of power. A sort of dominion.

            And Krueger was the one for it, wasn’t he? He had to be lonely, and out of place, in his own way, a bit like she was. And he seemed like a truly difficult person. He probably didn’t have many friends. She knew his story. He hadn’t experienced too many people in his life just being kind to him, for no apparent reason.

            And they had had sex. Aoife didn’t know what romance felt like, and she wasn’t sure she ever had. She knew sex was often not connected with romance, or any sentiment at all. Sex could be connected with all sorts of different feelings. But maybe eventually he would connect sex with her, and with some positive feelings. At very least it might keep him coming back, so that she had a chance to do the rest of it.

            She didn’t want it to be romantic, anyway. She had had crushes, sometimes, in her life, but the feelings never lasted. They fizzled out like a candle flame. Sometimes, there was nothing left behind, after the flame burned down. Other times, there were many things left behind. But she had no _romance_ in her body; not so that it would last. It was just as well this would not be a romantic enterprise.

          She fell asleep making a list in her mind of all the things she could do for Fred Krueger, to make him reliant on her for things he had never even considered that he needed. She fell asleep wanting to know if she could even do it.

 

* * *

 

           Freddy unzipped his pants, feeling an unusual sense of disappointment with himself. _She’s just some high-schooler. Lighten the fuck up._

           <Freddy?> He grimaced as Aoife returned from the bathroom. She was wearing slightly lower-rise granny panties and a bra that seemed marginally less ugly than the functional type she probably wore on the daily; her arms were folded over her abdomen as if that would hide her stomach’s shape and size. She smelled freshly of soap and skin cream, but it didn’t improve Freddy’s mood.

            “What?” he grunted.

           <I, uh, had an idea.>

_“What?”_

           <I wondered if we could try some stuff?> she asked, tiptoeing toward him.

            “The hell does that mean?”

           <Well, like…I have some older scarves and belts, that are a little too small for me – the belts, I mean; scarves don’t get too small, of course,> Aoife explained. <We don’t have…you know…handcuffs or anything, but maybe…maybe I could get tied up with those, and if needed, you could cut me out of them and it would still be safe enough. You’re not supposed to use scarves for bondage, but again, if you cut me out, it should be fine…>

           Freddy shrugged blankly. “Uh…sure. Fine.”

           <In fact, I was thinking, um…> Aoife picked up a slip of computer paper off her dresser, bringing it over. <There’s some stuff on here, like cuffs and flavored condoms in case of…well, in case of blow jobs, and some, uh…well, some lube. Do you like doing it in the ass?> she added, catching Freddy even more off-guard.

            “ _What?”_ he snapped, trying not to choke on his own spit and bile. “Uh…I…”

           Aoife seemed to realize she’d done whatever she was trying to do, very gracelessly. < _My_ ass, I meant, sorry. Not…not pegging, or anything. I…uh…I was just asking because, um, that’s what I was thinking the lube could be for. Lubricant, I mean. Because, you know, Vaseline is supposed to be bad for you… >

            “I know what lube is.” Freddy shook his head, which was already spinning. “Aoife, what…where the hell did you get the idea for any of this shit?”

           <I…I went online, and looked up some stuff.> Aoife smiled sheepishly, but with a level of anticipation that vaguely creeped Freddy out. Her hands were starting to flap. <It’s called BDSM. I heard a little about it from Arianrod, but of course she didn’t want to talk to a teenager about sex stuff, so I did research on my own after that. It stands for…um… ‘bondage, dominance, sadism, and masochism.’>

            “Masochism…” A light went on in Freddy’s head. “You mean S and M?”

           <Well, yes, but they call it BDSM now,> Aoife said matter-of-factly. <Actually,> she added more cheerfully. <I think it’s really cool that there’s an official community for people who like this stuff. Don’t you?>

            “Uh…I guess.” Freddy shrugged. “So…you want to do that?”

           <If you’re okay with it, yes please,> said Aoife quickly. <I figured you like sadism, so this could even be kind of an outlet for you? We just have to do it in a way with lots of clear communication, which we can do, I bet.> She tapped the list. <And I think we need this stuff.>

            “And you want me to get it?” Freddy asked. “Why’s it got to be me?”

           <You’re the adult!>

            “So are you! That’s what you _said!”_

           <Of course I am, but you’re the adult who’s… _older_ , and who can go to sex shops and buy adult products without anyone thinking it’s odd,> Aoife explained as if it was obvious. <I’ll pay for it all, of course, don’t worry. I mean, it was my idea, so that’s only fair. I was just thinking you could pick it up, basically.>

            “What?”

           Aoife’s brow puckered at his response. <I mean…I looked at prices online, and it seems like it can get expensive, so I was thinking I could give you a hundred dollars for now, and if there’s any change, just keep it.>

            “Uh huh.” Freddy stared at her. “So you’re _paying_ me now?”

           <What?> Aoife’s apparent confusion deepened. <No…I mean, just for the sex stuff. Of course I’m not paying you for…for sex. I just thought…>

            “Yeah, whatever, Princess. Sorry I can’t put out for you tonight; I’ve got a headache,” Freddy snapped, storming out of the bedroom past her, down to the kitchen to look for booze. He couldn’t have explained exactly what his problem was, but he wasn’t planning on trying to anyway.

 

           She followed him downstairs; she had a hard time leaving shit alone, it seemed. Freddy kicked himself mentally at the memory that Annie, Arianrod, and even Loretta had done all the same things when an argument was brewing. _Why do you always go for chicks who want to keep fighting instead of just leaving you alone?_

           <Do you _not_ want to do this? > Aoife demanded.

            “Do what, shop for your fucking sex grocery list?”

           <No, I mean _this! >_ she snapped. <Do you not want to do this…this sex thing with me? Any of it? What’s the problem?>

_“Why do you need to fucking know?”_

           <So that I can try to _solve_ it, obviously! > Aoife looked like she wanted to say something else, but instead, she took a few deep breaths. Her arms were folded protectively over her chest. Freddy couldn’t help but be glad that Annie wouldn’t be home. <I want to give you what you want, but I can’t if you don’t tell me what that is.>

           That did admittedly shut Freddy up, because he realized he didn’t know. Something about the way Aoife had asked, the way she was treating this thing between them now, the money… shit, I really am acting like a pissy girlfriend, complaining there’s not enough romance or something.

            “You came to me and you just expected I’d…” He shrugged aimlessly.

           <I’m sorry, but that’s your reputation.>

            “So? You know that’s a bullshit reason.”

           <Well, you always seemed proud of your reputation before,> Aoife pointed out annoyingly. She paused, seeing this was cutting no ice with Freddy. Then she added, <And…I didn’t know how else to start it.>

            “Well, not fucking like that.”

           <I thought I should just be honest and direct,> she said, a little more apologetically. <Besides…I didn’t know what else to do. I mean…I can’t wine and dine you.>

           Freddy found himself unexpectedly snorting at that last remark, despite his anger – the thought of it, maybe. “You could’ve tried,” he said sarcastically. “I got a tux somewhere I could wear.”

           Now she was the one snorting. That seemed a weird habit, for a royal. <I didn’t think you were the dating type.>

            “Well…I’m not,” he had to agree.

           <Besides, people might see us in public. Not that I’d be embarrassed or anything,> she said quickly. <That’s not why I say that. I just think it would cause…problems.>

            “No,” Freddy admitted. “It would. I can see that.”

           She managed a rueful little half-smile. It was crooked and close-lipped and seemed different from the smile she used in public; less coached, maybe. Sidious had probably trained her to smile like a politician from the age of two.

           <Besides,> she said. <I didn’t think you’d want me to wine and dine you.>

            “No…I guess that’s true.”

           <You don’t seem like the sort of man who’d be into that. And I’m a girl. It’s not supposed to be my role anyway, right?> she pointed out.

            “I wouldn’t think you’re the kind of girl who cares about that shit,” he retorted. “You’re a _feminist,_ right?”

           <Yes,> Aoife said, although Freddy was surprised to hear the little pause in her voice. <Or a womanist, maybe, at least,> she added. Freddy didn’t know what that meant, so he kept quiet. <But…you always seem like you want to be kind of…I don’t know…gender-conforming. On purpose. Like you really want to be the…the man.>

            “Don’t most guys?”

           <I think most ‘manly’ guys don’t try so hard?> she posited with a little shrug. <Or maybe to me it just seems like a conscious effort. To try hard at being anything, man or woman or anything else.>

            “You think I _try hard?”_ Freddy asked, trying not to get offended and pissy again.

           <Harder than you need to,> Aoife said, a little apologetically. <I mean, you’re already a man. Nobody doesn’t think you are. I promise.>

           Freddy glowered at her until she added, <I’m sorry. I know I’m being clumsy at this. I honestly don’t want things to keep being like this between us.>

            “Like what? What are you looking for, sweet nothings?”

           <No, just…at each other’s throats when we’re not fucking. It’s too much stress for me.>

           Part of Freddy agreed, but he didn’t feel like copping to it. “Then maybe you should stop assuming so much shit about me.”

           <That’s a good point,> Aoife said carefully. <You’re right. I’m sorry.>

 _Come on, you don’t want to lose this pussy. Just unclench your asshole a little bit for two seconds_ , Freddy told himself. _She’s being autistic as hell, but she’s trying._

            “I’ll buy the shit,” he said. “The stuff you wanted to try. I’ll do it.”

           <Are you sure> -

            “I said I’d do it.”

           She paused carefully, then added, <Maybe we can…slow down a bit. Maybe just one new thing to start.>

          “You think I’m scared of kinky shit?” he asked with a snigger.

          <No, I just think we could start out slowly, that’s all. It’s got nothing to do with you,> she said, clearly lying.

           “Whatever.”

           She gave him a little grin. <Which do you think will come in handy first? Flavored condoms, or lube? That’s up to you.>

            Freddy looked over at her for a while, still trying to figure out what the kid’s deal was. Finally, he said, “I’ll think about it.”

           <Okay, well, you can surprise me. I’ll get you the money> -

           Freddy growled. “Why do you keep harping on that fucking money?”

           <Because I want Crys to have enough money for college!> Aoife bit her lip. <I know things like this…like what we’re doing…can get expensive, and I’m sorry, but I do have more money out of the two of us. I don’t like the idea of you spending Crys’ money on me. It makes me feel guilty.>

           Freddy willed himself to stop freaking out about the money. Because, damn her, she was right.

            “Fine,” he said at last. “But you’re getting the change back. I don’t want your fucking handouts.”

           Aoife nodded, that careful look on her face again. <That’s fine.>

           They stood in the kitchen looking at each other for a while, until Freddy recognized the girl’s look and said, “Don’t say it.”

           <What?>

            “No, I’m not in the mood anymore. Don’t make a thing out of it.”

           Aoife nodded, and then asked, <So…would you like a drink?>

            “Yeah. Annie should have something, even if it’s just wine.”

           Aoife nodded, and Freddy sat down while she searched the kitchen until she found a bottle in the pantry. It was probably for cooking, but Freddy didn’t care. “Don’t bother with a wine glass. Just give me a cup or a mug.”

           Aoife obliged, pouring out a little highball glass’ worth of it for herself. Under the circumstances, Freddy didn’t feel like stopping her from drinking. She only took a sip, anyway, before grimacing. < _Ugh_. >

            “Yeah. And it’s not even good wine.”

           <I should’ve known. I don’t like alcohol’s taste much.>

            “You’ll learn to appreciate it when you’re older, trust me.”

           <I’d probably like a sweet drink,> she mused. <Like a…a ‘pink squirrel’ or something.>

           Freddy laughed. “Haven’t heard of that cocktail in forever. I think Annie tried one down at the Lonely once.”

           <They drank them in _Roseanne_ , when Crys and Annie and I were watching reruns,> Aoife explained. <Since it’s colorful, I guess I assumed it was sweet.>

            “It is, sure. Forget what’s in it. Hey…” Freddy raised an eyebrow ridge at her. “You snort sometimes when you laugh.”

           She looked guarded. <So?>

            “So I can’t imagine old Sidious letting that habit slide. You might do it in public or in front of tabloids, and…”

           <He didn’t. Doesn’t,> Aoife said bitterly, and Freddy watched her steel herself and gulp down more wine. <That’s why I’m doing it.>

           Freddy felt a little grudging sympathy for that sentiment. “Good,” he said, trying not to sound uncertain as he nodded.


	6. Chapter 6

           Freddy had almost finished _The Catcher in the Rye_ , and he was mad. That by itself wasn’t too unusual. But he was angrier than his usual baseline of rage, and he didn’t know exactly why.

           Mostly, he was angry at the main character, this Holden kid. First of all, the kid was a spoiled rich brat, the kind of kid he’d have had fun playing with before he took him, in the good old days. He had parents who would send him to private schools and sanatoriums all over the place, and he just kept flunking out and not even trying. Freddy knew he wasn’t any kind of scholar, but with stuff like that just _handed_ to him, the least he would’ve done was try.

           And then Holden started having these stupid issues about innocence. He bought all that “innocent little kiddies” crap hook, line, and sinker. He started talking about some poem about running through rye, and then catching a bunch of brats before they could jump over a cliff.

           As if brats deserved that. As if they _needed_ that. It wasn’t like anyone had ever caught Freddy while he’d been running through the rye toward any of the goddamn metaphorical cliffs in his life.

           Who would ever want to do that, anyway? What would it be like, to actually just _want_ to do shit like that, for random people you didn’t know, for no pay or any other reason? Did some people actually _think_ like that? Freddy didn’t really buy that, on the whole. Everyone was out for number one; some people were just more up-front about it.

           But – and here was the really crazy part – even as Freddy hated Holden, he hated what had happened to the kid at the end, too. What goddamn sense did that even make?

 _Of course_ they’d stuck him in a loony bin. If the kid was poor then it would have been jail, probably, but still – fucked up as the kid was, he’d managed to see through all their bullshit. Say what you wanted about his “catcher in the rye” thing, Holden had been dead-on when it came to spotting who the “phonies” were. And that creepy fucking teacher of his. What the fuck had he been supposed to do about that asshole, pull his fucking pants down for the guy?

           So of course, they’d locked Holden up at the end. He’d mentioned they were going to send him to another school soon. Of course they were. Again, if he’d been poor it would have been a job, or one of the shitty state asylums, and not another cushy prep school, but _still_. They were going to lock Holden up until he was ready to shut up and work, and then they were going to suck him dry. And then he’d be dead soon enough, or wishing he was.

           When someone knocked on the door, Freddy was almost glad to be distracted, because seriously, why was he getting so angry about a stupid book? It didn’t matter. It wasn’t _real_.

           He didn’t hide his scowl at opening the door and seeing Aoife Palpatine. It had been a few weeks since their night together, and while Freddy didn’t regret it, he was forever suspicious that the girl would try to turn it into A Thing, like Annie had. Women tended to be like that; the stereotype existed for a reason. “What?”

           As usual, she quailed back a little, but didn’t back down. <Crys isn’t here today. Neither is Jane.>

            “So?”

           <Can I eat lunch in here?> She shrugged, a little defiantly. <I just don’t want to be in the cafeteria by myself.>

            “Go eat in the library or the bathroom or something.”

           <The bathroom? Ewww.>

            “Then the library, like I said.”

           <That’s against the rules! Besides, I’d get caught. That’s my kind of luck.> She sagged. <Please? I just want to eat and spend the period in a corner or something. I’ll be quiet.>

           Would she tell Annie or someone what they’d done if he said no? Freddy wouldn’t put it past her, he decided. “Fine. Get in here.”

 

           Aoife had not anticipated this phase in her plan.

           She had planned to invite Freddy over for sex a few more times, of course, maybe even a full BDSM scene. He didn’t seem like the sort of person who’d ever explored kink, and she had looked forward to being the one to introduce him to it more fully. He was a sadist; he’d enjoy it. He’d probably find it an outlet. It was the sort of thing a Lover – a Mistress – a _Woman_ – would do.

           She hadn’t wanted to come to him like this. Not here, in school – she felt like anything but a Woman here. She felt like a desexualized, grimy, overwhelmed child, unable to truly breathe here, unable to do anything but try to balance the need for work with the intense desire to escape into her imagination, and usually feel as if she was failing.

           She especially hadn’t wanted to come for _help_ , needing something from him with nothing to give in return. Being vulnerable. It was hard to admit implicitly to him that she didn’t feel comfortable eating alone at a table, where anyone could come over to hassle her – she’d seen it happen to loners before – or begging to sit down with strangers. To admit that she would feel uneasy because she didn’t know them, and because she was forcing her company on them, preying on their decency and politeness.

           At least Fred Krueger was a known quantity – he’d most likely leave her alone if she did the same to him, and if he tried anything, she could fight him, and tell people what he’d tried to do to her. It was _straightforward_. The only things he was liable to do to her were things she knew how to react to.

           She ate quickly, and quietly, with sidelong glances at Krueger. He sat back in his chair, fidgeted for a few minutes, and then, after some hesitation, reached for the little paperback book sitting on the desk, and dove back into it. Aoife sat forward on her own theater prop chair, trying to read its cover.

           He noticed, and glared at her. “What’s the matter with you?”

           <Nothing. What book is that?> She recoiled anew under his glare. <I’m just curious.>

            “ _Catcher in the Rye_.” He folded his arms around himself. “I was bored, so I took it from one of the supply closets. I read it sometimes when I don’t have anything better to do. What’s it to you?”

           <It’s nothing to me. As I said, I was just curious.> Aoife ducked down and went back to her lunch. When she was done, she took out her own book – _All the King’s Men_ , which she technically had to read for AP English class, but thought she might be enjoying anyway – and started reading it.

            “What’s that?” the question startled her out of the book. She looked up, in his direction.

           <Oh. It’s called _All the King’s Men_. Crys and Jane and I are reading it for class. >

            “Any good?” He shrugged when she stared. “What? I’m gonna need another time killer after I’m done with this thing, right?” He held up his book.

           <I don’t know. Some parts of it are. Parts of it are very dense. Parts of it I don’t like.> Aoife looked down.

            “Well, _that’s_ helpful as fuck. What’s it _about?”_ he asked impatiently.

           <Um…well, there’s this man…well, there are two men. There’s the narrator, and then this other man named Willie Stark, who’s a politician.> Aoife wrinkled her nose. <I guess it’s supposed to be a story about how he started out so _pure_ and then of course power corrupted him because _human nature_ , and everything…rather pedestrian, I guess. Cliché, really.>

            “I thought you said you liked it. Or at least you weren’t sure.”

           <I do. But…> She struggled for the words. <I think that I like it for the wrong things. I think I read it in a way that the author wouldn’t want me to.>

            “What does _that_ mean?”

           <Well…because Willie Stark _is_ corrupt, but he’s helping the poor people of the state and he’s doing good things, and all his critics are these old money rich types who probably benefited from the way things were before him. And the corruption was already there when he was elected, and all he did really was streamline it and use it to do his job… > she shrugged. <I like Willie. Much more than I like the narrator. But I think that the author wants me to think Willie was wrong, and I don’t.> She shifted. <Actually, I think he was…courageous, in a weird way. Because he was willing to get his own hands dirty so that his people could have what they needed to live. He was making a sacrifice, which is what leaders are supposed to do for their people. He sacrificed his innocence and his moral purity, according to the morality of the novel at least, for the people he was serving.>

           A long silence, and then Aoife, realizing how in-depth she had gotten, shrugged with calculated mildness. <Anyway, so that’s why I don’t know what to think.> She looked up at his book. <I read that once, too; my sister had a copy, and I stole it, even though it was in large print, and the font was a little weird, because of her vision, you know. I don’t remember it so much. What did you think of it?>

           Krueger looked over at her, and after a while, answered, “Holden Caulfield’s an idiot.”

           <Why? I thought he was right about the phonies, personally.>

            “Yeah, he was. But he had this idea in his head about innocence and protecting kids and shit, and that stuff is useless. It doesn’t work. I don’t even think anyone’s got any innocence, anyway.” He shrugged.

           Aoife considered it. <Well, I don’t agree about the innocence part.>

            “Course you don’t. _You_ wouldn’t.” _You’re too normal_. _You’re probably a phony yourself._

           She bristled, but didn’t rise to the bait; she’d rather talk about books than argue, she decided. <Maybe the reason he wants to catch the children from falling is because he feels as if no one ever caught him, and if he can help other children avoid his fate, it’ll be almost like it didn’t happen. Metaphorically, you know.>

            “Well, sure, that could be it,” he agreed. “But it’s still stupid. It still happened to him, and it’ll happen to them. Sooner or later, it’ll happen again. And it happened anyway, no matter what he did. Ain’t no point.”

           <Well, you would protect Crys, wouldn’t you?> Aoife asked, seeing her opening, before she could stop herself.

           He turned sharply, and out of some instinct, she started gathering up her things, sure he was going to kick her out, at very least. There was always a chance he’d try to fight her.

           Instead he said, “Fuck you.” And then, “Where the hell are you going?”

           <I figured you would want me to leave now.>

            “Why?”

           <I realized after I said that that it would probably make you angry.>

            “Everything makes me angry. I don’t care what you say to me. And I didn’t tell you to go anywhere.”

           They stared at each other, and Aoife realized he was seeing what she would do. Maybe he wanted to see if what she’d said about what she liked in bed extended to real life. Maybe he was seeing what it took to drive her away. Maybe he was just curious.

           She sat back down and took her book back out. They both read in silence until the bell rang.

* * *

 

         Crys and the cast would be staying after, but the stage crew was allowed to go home. Aoife couldn’t have been more relieved. Her hands fumbled over the zipper on her bag, shaking a little, as she loaded her things into it from her locker before the late bus could leave. She wasn’t running late, but she wasn’t as early as would have made her comfortable either, and she knew she couldn’t walk home today.

        She thought longingly, again, of quitting stage crew.

        She wouldn’t do it, of course, but she would love to. It took so much energy, and it seemed to be pointless. What was she doing, that someone else couldn’t do better? What did she add, really? Wasn’t she more of a liability to the crew than an asset, given her clumsiness, her energy, and her level of demonstrated expertise?

        _It’s because it’s new to you. You’re going to get better at it_. She sighed deeply to herself, and felt a little calmer and cleaner inside.

         “Hey, there.”

         Aoife jumped and looked up. Her grandfather had often chastised her about being more mindful – it surely killed him inside to have to quote a Jedi, so he must have meant it – and in fact, usually it wasn’t a lack of mindfulness as much as it was being overwhelmed by everything the Force was constantly telling her. Usually. At this moment she had no such excuse.

         She turned, vaguely hoping it might be Freddy even as she realized it hadn’t been his voice, and when she saw the boy who’d given Crys her black eye coming toward her down the hall, a cold place opened in her stomach. Even though every one of her instincts fought it, she turned away from him, pointedly ignoring him, pretending to focus on the textbooks in her bag.

          He was coming toward her now; she could hear his footsteps behind her on the linoleum tiles, and it took all her self-control not to turn and look. She tried to descend into the Force and absorb some serenity, but there didn’t seem to be any to be had.

          Something poked the back of her head.

          She jumped again, and whirled around to face him, accidentally spinning herself out of her crouch and landing on her ass to the cracking of her knees; she bit back a little cry at the pain.

          He must _know_. He must _see_. Despite her Force connection, it was always the neurotypicals who could read her mind. He must see the fear in her face. He must know the power he held over her, in this moment. The thought made her feel truly sick.

          She stood up slowly.

          When she was standing up against the lockers, she folded her arms. She did not want to look at him, and felt it would make no difference whether she tried or not.

         <What?> she replied.

         He didn’t say anything else, but snickered a little, reaching out to touch a lock of hair that had started to spring back; would need to be ironed and oiled when she got home. She felt him twist it around one finger.

         “It’s all _wiry_ ,” he said, as if that was funny. “Eugh, that’s so weird.”

         <No, it’s not.>

          He just laughed, and his hand slid down her hair until it touched her collarbone, and her breath hitched without her meaning it to. He heard, and chuckled harder.

           It hitched again when his fingertips found the shape of her bra strap under the layers of cloth.

           It took her a few seconds after the fact to react, a few seconds of processing and then deciding, before she half-brushed, half-shoved his hand away.

           He kept laughing, and reached for her breast this time.

            It wasn’t so much a slap as it was an automatic, jerking response of her hand; otherwise it would have been harder. As it was, it did connect, with a sound and an impact that left Aoife’s own fingers momentarily smarting.

            He reeled back for a moment, but it wouldn’t be over like that. Aoife knew what he was going to do before he did it; was already preparing herself for the little cheap steel blade that popped out of the plastic hilt. _Ugh, so predictable,_ she managed to think despite the adrenaline rush. _So…Derry._

          The notion of coming at her with the knife had only just entered his mind when she kicked his knife-hand wide, setting him off balance. The kick set her off balance too, but she knew how to let herself fall into it, so that she could roundhouse him again, in the stomach this time, but just catching his jaw. Her skirt and scarf were billowing in the air; she felt as if she was flying, or dancing.

           This time, she did send him flying. He wasn’t burly, just tall and developed for their age. He hit the opposite wall of lockers, and Aoife was already running at him, her hand out, ready to punch, to shock, to slam all her energy into the wrist of his knife-hand. Too late, the blades inside her own walking stick were briefly remembered, then set aside. Better not to be the one who’d brought a weapon to school in this scenario. She didn’t need one, after all. Not for him.

          She couldn’t even say whether she physically made contact with his skin, or whether she just sent the power through the air, cracking his wrist – it did make an audible crack – his hand spasming open, dropping the knife. Still moaning over his hand, he scrambled after her, but for once, Aoife was quicker.

          By that time, her body knew what to do; had been taught what to do since it was able to move itself. She would not leave him ready to turn on her.

          The knife sank into the taut side of his body. It put up only a little more resistance than the linoleum skin of a practice dummy.

          He screamed, and Aoife reared back, taking the knife with her. A part of her knew that in a moment, she would panic. She could feel the anxiety moving up the arm of the hand that held the knife, toward her brain, like the half-second when she stubbed her toe, before the pain hit.

           For that half-second, she reveled in her serenity. There was, for the first time in her life, an end of Fear.

          She knew Freddy was there, had wheeled up his trolley with his cleaning supplies, before he started clapping.

          “Just caught the tail end of that,” he told her, voice echoing in the deserted hallway. “Real good, though. Some real _Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon_ shit.”

         Aoife nodded. Words were lost, but now, through the panic, she began to think.

 

          Freddy had been meaning to corner the shit who beat up Crys that afternoon, but Aoife had gotten there first. Now, he wondered whether the brat would die. No – the wound was too shallow, and in the wrong part of the torso. Nonlethal, unless he bled out.

          Which was a nice, slow way to go. A grin spread over Freddy’s face like spilled grease as he applauded the palace brat.

          Aoife was getting her breath back slowly, moving feebly, as if she was finally starting to come out of a trance. He didn’t expect her to be able to talk again yet, so he was a little startled when she said, <Freddy.>

          “What?”

          <Can you please give me a rag or a paper towel,> she managed, spitting it out too fast for it to be a question. <With a cleaner – with Windex or something, please.>

         A little intrigued – you could do some damage with a paper towel and cleaning fluid, if you got creative – Freddy wheeled his trolley closer and obeyed.

         And watched in some disappointment as Aoife just wiped down the handle of the knife, before throwing it back toward the whimpering, bleeding bastard. It clattered to the floor beside him, but he didn’t reach for it.

         Seeing Freddy’s confusion, or maybe sensing it, Aoife managed, <Fingerprints.>

          The jock was sniveling. “P-p-please, Aoife, you gotta – you gotta call an ambulance, please, I won’t…I won’t tell anyone…I swear…”

          Aoife brushed some stray hair back from her face. <No, you won’t.>

         “Aoife, please…”

         <You cornered me here and tried to assault me like the pig you are,> Aoife continued as if he hadn’t spoken. <We fought, and in the struggle, you accidentally stabbed yourself. That’s what you’ll tell them on the ambulance.> She pointed down at the knife. <Pick that up. It needs your fingerprints.> With one trembling hand, the boy did as he was told.

          She turned to Freddy. <Did any security cameras or anything catch this, do you think?>

          Freddy shook his head. “Not down this hall. At least, not clear enough to prove anything.”

         Aoife nodded, and then, to the boy, she said, <If you tell them what really happened, I’ll come back and finish the job.>

          “I swear I won’t tell,” he pleaded. “Please, call an ambulance…”

          “Don’t do it,” Freddy told her. He grinned. “We could take him back to my place. Make a little _date night_ out of it.” He had a momentary fantasy of fucking Aoife while she was covered in the brat’s blood. It was a nice thought after a long day at work.

         <No,> she said, and it wasn’t so much that he didn’t want to argue as that her tone just didn’t allow for it in that moment. <Watch him.> Leaning on the wall, she stumbled into one of the classrooms. <What’s the digit for dialing out?> she called behind her.

          He shifted, surprised she could use an Earth phone, between the telepathy and the alien technology thing. “Eight, I think.” He looked down at the kid, who was shaking and wouldn’t look back. He treated him to a feral grin anyway. “See you in your dreams, boy.”

          “No, please…” moaned the brat. “Please don’t…”

          “Oh, it’s too late for that now,” Freddy snarled down at him. “You shouldn’t have touched what’s mine, should you?”

         “But…but they say you can’t…you people, you’re not _allowed_ to anymore…”

         “As far as Bob Gray’s concerned, I got a good reason in this case. Don’t worry your pretty little head about me,” Freddy told him. “Besides, I’m in recovery. _Relapses_ are bound to happen.”

         Aoife poked her head out of the classroom. <I called them. We should both go before they get here, I think.>

         Freddy nodded. “I’ll take you home. But first, you look like you need a drink.” _After all, we should get you out of those bloody clothes, shouldn’t we, Princess?_

* * *

 

         He couldn’t breathe.

         There was air going into his lungs and air coming out of them, but it wasn’t enough somehow, it wasn’t _helping_ , because he was light-headed, and a little dizzy. Everything felt far away. He couldn’t feel his hands much, and he was cold – _cold!_ – for the first time in years.

         He opened his eyes, and it came flooding back. He was dead. Well, undead. Some kind of demon thing, apparently.

        And he was in his Boiler Room. Where he lived – well, no, didn’t _live_ , but existed. And here was his glove, right here on his hand.

        But then that had to mean it was _real_.

         All of it.

         _You killed her_.

         He’d chased her over the catwalks and the metal floor and in between the pipes and clouds of steam, until he had her right where he wanted her, and then…

         And then he’d plunged the glove into her gut and ripped it out again, watched her crumple to the floor, and then he’d slashed the blades across her throat until her blood spilled all over him and all over the glove and all over the floor and the pipes behind them.

         And then he bent down and brushed the hair out of her face without really knowing why, and…

        And now he was slick with sweat and his own gut was hollow and icy and was it a dream?

        He had bent down and brushed the hair out of her face and it was _Katherine_.

        He’d promised her on the day she was born that he would do better. He’d known he could never let himself hurt her; couldn’t fuck this up, it was too important. Even when he fell off the wagon the first time, he killed damn near every other kid in town _but_ her.

        _You killed her. She’s dead. You’re telling yourself it was just a dream, but you killed her. You can’t even tell yourself “I’d never do that,” because we both know that’s not true._

         She could be dead. He wouldn’t know. He didn’t know where she was right now. He couldn’t even check.

         He could look back at his glove, but he didn’t want to.

         He shook it off his hand and flicked it away. He didn’t want to look at it right now.

         He had to talk to someone. He hated feeling so needy, so weak, but he didn’t think he was going to make it if he didn’t. But Bob didn’t want to talk about kids, and Annie’d probably freak out about him hurting Crys if he said anything to her. Arianrod had never killed anyone; she wouldn’t get it.

         The Boiler Room was very big, and very empty, and he shivered.

         <Freddy?>

        Freddy groaned. He couldn’t handle kinky shit right now. This was probably the least erotic moment of his entire life.

        She stirred on the mattress next to him. <I heard you having a nightmare in here.>

         “I don’t have nightmares,” Freddy snapped. “I give ‘em to other people.” Talking felt awkward and clumsy.

         <You were sleeping, and you seemed really scared.>

         “It’s nothing. And I wasn’t sleeping.”

         Aoife just looked at him for a while with her pale blue eyes, as if she could see right through him. At last, she said, <It _was_ a nightmare, you know. I mean, it wasn’t real. >

         And suddenly the cold was ebbing away, and he felt strangely light-headed. God, if she was lying to him, he’d…“I know that,” he managed through his relief.

          <Do you want to talk about it?>

         Anger resurfaced. “ _No!”_

         He was turned away from her, sitting on the edge of the mattress. Now, he jerked away from a hand on his shoulder. “ _Don’t touch me!”_ He whirled around, furious at her suddenly, that she’d _been_ there; that she’d _seen_. “ _Get out!”_

 

         Aoife was still in her old pajamas; they felt sweaty and dirty after their night on the boiler room floor. She felt a little scared, easing herself down the stairs and hoping it would be fast enough to suit Krueger; of course she did.

         But also… _sorry_ for him. A little. She had felt some of his fear, and now her hyperempathy was acting up, and it felt almost as if she’d been the one having the nightmare, for all her physiological and psychological response to it. The panic was her own now.

         She had some idea of what PTSD could be like. Or whatever this was, since it seemed to behave a bit like PTSD. And given his story, finding that Krueger did have some trauma would hardly be surprising.

         _He shouldn’t be left like that._ It was beyond what Aoife felt or what she wanted; it was a plain fact. Nothing good came of leaving someone alone when they were like that.

         Besides, she rationalized, it would be good for her to be the one to comfort him, at least in part. Perhaps it would help bond him to her, given how few people probably treated him well.

         An idea came to her as she entered the grimy little kitchen space. She found a mug and was able to wipe it relatively clean, and a bottle of whiskey. There was no kettle, but a small pot would do. Finally, after going back through the door and digging through her coat pockets, she found what she was looking for, brought it back to the Boiler Room, and got to work.

         After marshalling her strength, she was able to make it up the stairs one more time. He’d left his bedroom; he was at his workbench now. “Thought I told you to scram,” he said, without looking up from the tinkering he was doing with his glove.

         Putting the cup down on the end of the workbench, Aoife debated what to say. Finally, she managed, <I’m going.> She meant it.

 

         A little while later, Freddy looked up at the still-lukewarm mug, and after eyeing it for a few long seconds, picked it up. It did at least feel warm and good in his hands. There was a dark liquid in it, too thin to be coffee. He tasted it experimentally, wondering idly if she’d tried to poison him. Probably not; Aoife wasn’t always the brightest, but she was smart enough to know that wouldn’t work.

         It was tea. He hadn’t had tea since Loretta was alive to make it, but this was definitely it. There was no milk or sugar, which was fine. There was a lot of whiskey in it. That was better.

          He’d always preferred coffee. He drank it anyway, until nothing was left but the soggy teabag and the brown-orange ring around the inside of the mug from when it had sat steeping.

* * *

 

         Annie was at some movie night thing with Arianrod and the McAshtons, Crys was out with Jane, and Aoife was home alone, so Annie’s house drew Freddy like a magnet. They had nothing planned, but Freddy still figured he’d be welcome. Aoife Palpatine’s libido was generally about as persistent as the rest of her.

         He realized something was amiss when he went to get a drink from Annie’s pathetic booze supply – between a teenaged kid and her own meds, there wasn’t any reason to have much in the house – and next to the solitary dusty, unopened bottles of Drambue and Jack Daniels respectively, he saw an empty space. Curiosity piqued, and with some suspicion already of what was happening, Freddy looked in the fridge for some juice or soda or – yep, there was a big orange juice carton-shaped space on the door. Freddy tried to quiet his prescient bad feeling about this; _if she wants to throw herself a little party, why should I care?_

         Annie’s house was small and dated-looking, something out of a home-and-garden thing from the fifties, but it must have been a lot better-built than Freddy had assumed to look at it, because the walls had to be pretty thick. He didn’t hear the music until he started climbing the stairs to look for Aoife.

         He opened the door and the music, plus the smells of vodka and oranges, and a clove cigarette, hit him in the face.

_“So it's gonna be forever_

_Or it's gonna go down in flames_

_You can tell me when it's over_

_If the high was worth the pain_

_Got a long list of ex-lovers_

_They'll tell you I'm insane_

_Cause you know I love the players_

_And you love the game!...”_

 

          “Never figured you for a Taylor Swift fan,” Freddy’s mouth said as the rest of him looked her over. She was already three sheets to the wind, the bottle half gone and the carton of orange juice looking light, too. Leaning back in pajama bottoms that were nice and short – thighs kind of big, but they had a good shape to them, made you want to grab them – and a too-baggy T-shirt. Her hair was poofing out again, like nothing so much as a big wiry halo. The cigarette in her hand had gone out now; she didn’t seem to notice. When Freddy leaned across her to turn the music down, she glared at him, but blearily.

         <You know even who that is?> she returned, slurring a bit. The order of the words seemed off, too.

          “I stalk teenagers,” Freddy pointed out, taking the cigarette and snuffing it out unnecessarily on her nightstand’s glass surface. “I know what shit they’re always listening to. Never figured you for a pop fan, like I said. But maybe when you drink your taste gets shittier.”

         <Yeah, probably.> She looked down at the hand that had held the cigarette, as if faintly surprised it was gone.

         Then she looked over at him. <I don’t – no sex tonight, you know.>

          “Okay. Thanks for clearing that up.”

         <Glad that stopped you,> she remarked. <It seemed like – you know. Thought you maybe wouldn’t.>

          “I’d get in trouble. Plus you’re too drunk to be interesting.”

         <I never am,> she said, sniffling and leaning back on her pillows.

          “Never interesting? Nah, don’t sell yourself short. If you weren’t a space princess I’d say you ought to do this for a living.” He glanced over at her, waiting for a reaction. Anything to shake her out of whatever funk she was in, even if it was her getting pissed at him. “The sex, I mean. Not the drinking and smoking.”

         <I should,> she replied vaguely. <Better at that, probably. Need a good pimp, though. I’m a fucking dumbass.>

          “You kidding? You know more big words at eighteen than I know at my age.”

         <Still a dumbass.> She sniffled again, and this time a few tears leaked out of the corners of her eyes. <I – I suck at the stage thing – >

          “Stage crew?”

         <Yeah, you know…they keep telling me I’m, I’m like, moving the stuff too loud. And then I try to move it quieter, and like…it’s still too loud. And like…you know, I never know what to do, so I’m always like…following people around, asking, “what should I do?” And it’s stupid.> She grabbed for the bottle, and Freddy moved that out of her reach, too. <Like, I can’t even do a play. How can I…how can I do the Empire?>

         Freddy took his hat off so he could rub his own scalp in agitation. He’d been bored tonight, sure, but this was getting depressing. “I mean, you’ll learn. You got years ahead of you, right?”

         <Nobody likes me.> She grabbed aimlessly again, and Freddy realized her hand was looking for the tissue box. He gave it to her. She took one, awkwardly, with a hand that was starting to palsy. <I mean, even you…it’s just sex. And I’m okay…that’s okay…but then it’s not. Right?> She shrugged. <Because everybody else – Crys and Jane and stuff – and then it’s like…even if I don’t want it, I _do_. Because when you don’t have it, then everybody thinks…well, everybody knows, I guess. >

         She snickered at something. Freddy wasn’t clear on what. “You telling me you want me to be your _boyfriend?”_

         < _No_. > She rolled her eyes like he was the one not making sense. <What the fuck would I even do with that? With a _boyfriend?_ I _said_ – it’s like, you don’t want it, but then…you _do_. Because of everyone else. ‘Cause they _have_ it. >

          “Oh, okay.” Freddy still didn’t get it, but asking a sad drunk to explain their ramblings was a fool’s errand.

         Aoife leaned further back, staring blankly at the ceiling. <Sooner or later,> she mused. <Like, at some point, you’ve got to say…like…you’ve got to admit that…that you know. That nobody wants you. And you’re a burden. And like…all you can do, is, like, you play these games and you act like…you dress up. And you do that.> She gestured at the frozen music video on the console screen. <And soon you don’t know…like…is it you, and all the games and stuff, or is it them, being…being dicks and just telling you it’s you? You don’t know. They want it to be you. But you want it to be them. Maybe it’s you after all.> She shrugged again, and sniffled more.

         Freddy sat at the foot of the bed in a brooding silence of his own, mostly due to his own inability to handle this, his strong desire to be literally pretty much anywhere else. He looked down at the vodka bottle. “How are you gonna explain this to Annie?” She shrugged aimlessly.

         Freddy shook his head. “You gotta water it down. You’re lucky it’s clear, so that’ll work. It’s tougher with whiskey.” She raised her head and cocked it at him. “What? You think I was buying my own booze when I was still a kid around your age? I had no fucking money. And if I got caught dipping into the old man’s supply, well, that was no fucking picnic.”

         She snickered again. <You had to walk ten miles uphill to get…to get drinks.> The wording and delivery were piss-poor, but he could see where she was going, and it was probably a good sign that she was cracking wise.

          “Yeah, that’s right,” he said, with a little grin of his own. “Ten miles uphill both ways, in a blizzard. Now get off my lawn.”

         The smile drained off her face, along with its general coloring. “What?” Freddy asked, getting that feeling again.

         <Room’s spinning,> she managed to grunt.

          “Oh, fuck.” He grabbed for the wastebasket and gave it to her just in time for her to stick her head in it. “Okay. Yep.”

         <Ugh,> she groaned.

          “What’d you expect?” Heaving again, she didn’t reply. “I ain’t cleaning that up.”

         She ignored him, continuing to puke her guts out as one hand combed shakily through her hair, trying to pull it back. With a mental growl, Freddy reached up and did his best to hold it back from her face, thankful for once that Annie had never been much of a drinker.

         When he could hear her just spitting bile, she sat up and felt for a tissue to wipe her face. Her color looked better, so he felt okay putting the wastebasket aside. “Charming.”

         <Still more than you,> she managed, to her credit.

          “Did I say you weren’t?”

         <Thanks.> She gesticulated expansively around at the room. <For…staying.>

         It was Freddy’s turn to shrug and search for words. “Uh. It’s okay.”

         She managed a small smile, and to his mild, momentary horror, leaned her head against his shoulder, face buried in sweater. Predictably, she turned her head after just a few seconds so her nose faced outward. <Sorry,> she managed. <Head’s heavy.>

          “I’m not surprised. But you got pillows.” He didn’t shove her off, though. She felt warm. A different kind of warm than he was.

         A _living_ warmth.

         Or some such bullshit.

         It should have been freakier than it was. That was the disturbing part, he thought later. The scene’s not-bad-ness. It was fundamentally _okay_ to be in that moment; not that he wished it would _never_ end, but he didn’t find himself wishing for the end to come immediately, either.

         Between that and the warmth on his shoulder, he was reminded of Kathy. When he’d used to pick her up, her head would be on his shoulder like that. Which he wasn’t going to say aloud, because mentioning Aoife and Kathy in the same sentence sounded creepy and fucked up even to _him_.

         She was asleep a few minutes later, and he’d lied about the puke – he threw out the wastebasket’s bag on his way out, and took the vodka with him. As far as Annie knew, he drank it, and Aoife had just had a craving for orange juice.

         He tried not to think about Annie’s face when she learned he’d been alone with the girl.

         _She doesn’t know a damn thing. It’ll be fine_.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (TW for transmisogynistic slurs.)

The big Victorian house was quiet, for once. The relatives were eating in their own cabins, mobile homes, and cellar- or extension-apartments on the grounds, and Owain and Arianrod had taken whoever was left out for a family meal and a movie. It was too bad that the drive-through theater down in Bangor, which had an ice cream stand attached, had just closed for the season. As it was, they were having to make do with the mall theater, so different from the grand palace of a cinema down in Derry that Orla could still remember, with balcony seating and enormous screens. That had been driven out of business, another symptom of the town’s slow demise.

Orla shivered as she wove her just-dried hair into the most traditional-looking braid she could. Svet had offered to curl her daughter’s hair, but something about the proceedings made Orla want to act as conservatively as possible. She’d minimized the amount of makeup to the bare amount that she thought was needed to make her face look its most feminine. Most of it was eye stuff and contouring, which she was getting pretty good at. She preferred makeup that you could actually see, but tonight didn’t seem like the night for blue eyeshadow or iridescent purple nails. Even her dress was high-collared, a little old-fashioned. Svet had bought it for her daughter last Christmas, or maybe the one before, while seemingly forgetting that it wasn’t the 70s or 90s anymore. It was maybe an inch too short in the skirt, but it still made her look appropriately church-y.

Her stomach turned over – she was pretty sure it was just anxiety, but it was still a supremely uncomfortable feeling – when she peeked out at the parlor to see her father sitting with Barlow _(what’s even his full name and title, anyway?)._ Barlow had made an effort, putting on a somewhat dusty-looking velvet waistcoat, and he seemed bathed and _clean_ at the very least, but it still struck her how _old_ he looked. She hadn’t remembered just how ancient he apparently was, maybe older than her father.

 _That’s really crappy and lookist of you, jeez_.

And her Dysphoria Voice added, _At least he’s probably got the right set of genitals. That makes one of you_.

“Will you call them into the dining room, and bring out the wine and true-blood?” Her mother said from behind her at the stove. “They’re on the counter by the radio. The roast is almost ready, and I can serve it in just a minute…” she turned and caught her daughter’s expression.

“Do you want to go upstairs?” she asked finally.

“What do you mean?” Orla asked, confused. “We’re supposed to have dinner…”

“You can go upstairs and we can pretend you’re sick,” Svet said, a bit reluctantly. “I’ll go out and break the news to Barlow and your father. You can even give the ring back – I mean, one of us will go over tomorrow and explain the situation to him, and give it back for you.” Orla knew from her tone that she wouldn’t be making the offer if it wasn’t for her dislike of Barlow.

“No,” she said, taking a deep breath. “We already…you and Dad already did so much preparation, and it…it just doesn’t feel right to not even try it.”

Svet sighed and shook her head, but didn’t argue. Orla reached for the two dark red bottles by the radio.

 

* * *

 

The dining room table was unusually empty and quiet. With its long, white, crocheted-lace cloth and the china and crystal set around it, it reminded Orla of when the family celebrated Shabbat or the first couple nights of Chanukah for Arianrod’s benefit. The table was always beautiful and elegant in a solemn way then; as the McAshtons welcomed their future Clanmother by engaging in her religion for just a few nights in the year. It might have been tourist-y of them, but Arianrod never seemed to mind.

Orla dwelled on last year’s Chanukah celebrations to keep from thinking about tonight. It was easier and better to remember the taste of the latkes and homemade donut holes they’d eaten along with the still-bloody lamb, and the beauty of the menorah candles reflected in the dark windows and the crystal wine goblets, not to mention the collection of menorahs lit together at the service she’d gone with Arianrod and Owain to in Bangor.

Barlow kept staring at her. She couldn’t forget the look in his eyes when she’d come out to announce dinner.

It was a hungry look.

And that, thought Orla, made it sound much more appealing than it was. She’d sometimes dared to imagine being lusted over by men as if it might be something fun – not fetishistic and strange, but actually complimentary and wanted – and she’d always hoped it would be good.

Not like this. This felt uncomfortable and filthy.

“This is delicious, Svetlana,” Barlow paused his staring to tell her mother. “Did Orla help to make it?”

Svet puckered a moment like she’d sucked a lemon, but she just cut another bright pink bite of meat for herself, looking demurely at her plate. “Not much, but I’m sure she’d be able to. I’ll give her the recipe.”

Barlow returned his focus to Orla. “You don’t help your mother in the kitchen?” he chided lightly.

“When she wants me to,” Orla heard herself reply. “She had me set the table and make sure the china wasn’t dusty and stuff.”

“Orla was probably reading, or doing homework. Our daughter is an excellent student,” said Ranulf pointedly. “She spends a great deal of time preparing for class, or studying independently; which her mother and I encourage. We would hope that any husband of hers would do the same. There are several academic scholarships we’ve had our eyes on for her, for college.”

“Of course,” Barlow waved this away. “There is much time to discuss it. Your work ethic is admirable,” he told Orla, who was actually surprised by the relative progressivism of the compliment. _At least it wasn’t about cooking_. “And how is school? Do you still attend the humans’ facility in Derry?”

“Yes, I do.” Orla was unable to keep herself from adding, as casually as she could, “Until Arianrod and everyone can get the _Salem’s Lot_ one running again, it’s the only school in the area where kids like us can go.” _Castle Rock School District isn’t contained enough to take a bunch of photosensitive kids with paperwork from the 70s and 80s who still swear they’re teens, without too many people noticing. Even Bob Gray’s abilities wouldn’t mask all that, not there._

Svet looked up from her plate. “I think I was just talking to our Witch Tasini about Salem’s Lot the other day,” she said mildly. “Barlow, I don’t suppose you’ve been down to see how your fledglings’ efforts are coming along?”

It was Barlow’s turn to look demure. “I had decided they were free to construct whatever they would like to in their village,” he said. “Regardless of my approval.”

Orla’s brow furrowed. “Wait…you don’t…do you not want them to get the high school working?”

Barlow looked like a man who’d stumbled into an unwanted discussion of politics or religion at the table. Which, maybe he had. “’Opposed’ is a strong word. It simply seems unnecessary to me.”

“Why?”

“I believe the true lessons our kind needs are not typically taught in the classroom.” Barlow took a sip of Tru-Blood, a look of disgust crossing his features momentarily as he tasted it. “Certainly not from a human curriculum.”

Orla willed herself not to argue; _he’s from the Old Country. Besides, I guess considering queer history, there’s something to be said for anti-assimilation._

“The last thing we need is more humans here,” said Barlow, and Orla nearly called him out until he added, “They create inroads for the Slayers, whether intentionally or not. It is not safe. I met two refugees at the boardinghouse in Salem’s Lot just a little while back…”

Orla looked up. “Do you mean Jane?” she asked, interested and eager to get back on neutral territory.

“We had her over a few nights ago; she came to study with you, Orla, didn’t she?” Ranulf asked, and Orla nodded.

“Yes, she is the fledgling,” Barlow agreed. “I spoke with her sire, but I did meet her. They were chased here across the Atlantic, apparently.”

Orla nodded. Jane hadn’t said much about it, of course, and Orla wouldn’t push her to. “I can’t even imagine that. Having to leave like that…”

“In a human, Christian land like this, I doubt we will ever be safe,” Barlow said, a bit morosely. “That sick boy in Derry – I heard that his family despairs of any medicine for him, and they may be looking for an exorcist. If one came out here, would Slayers be far behind? I am glad of Robert’s efforts, but I still fear that someday they will not be enough.”

Orla turned to her parents, surprised to see them both looking solemn and pensive at this. Of course, they might just be pretending to agree so as not to cause undue friction, but she didn’t think so.

It wasn’t that she’d never felt alienated in the United States. Whenever people assumed she was from Asia – usually Chinese – and adopted, when she was out with her family; she knew she didn’t look like her last name would be McAshton, or like she’d go to an Eastern Orthodox church, or know a thousand times more words of Gaelic, German, and even Yiddish and Ladino than Mandarin or Cantonese. Growing up near Derry, going to school there, she’d heard the usual “Chinese, Japanese, dirty knees” rhymes and the teachers’ assumptions. But her species, and her sex and gender, had always seemed like the bigger sources of disparity. Plenty of Asian kids got adopted by white parents, after all, even if that wasn’t her actual story. Not many were trans, though – or vampire, for that matter.

She’d never fully considered the possibility of being in danger in the US; at least, no more danger than anywhere else in the world. Maybe less, in some respects, especially with her gender. _I never thought of this country as anything but home._

“Arianrod says stuff like that sometimes, too,” she remarked, half thinking out loud. “Talks about how she needs a go-bag, or how she’s glad she knows how to use guns. She always acts like it’s a Jewish thing, because of the Holocaust. Of course, people always think she’s Arab, too, so it’s probably also about that.”

“I think perhaps it’s an immigrant thing,” Ranulf suggested. “Or a thing in communities that haven’t assimilated much. Which would include the Jews, I believe; even here and now.”

“I read online that fascism is rising in Europe again,” Orla said. “Because of the economic stuff with Wall Street, now that it’s had an effect overseas, people think. I wonder if there’s a connection between humans being more fascist and the Slayers getting bolder? Because there’s a big religious element to fascism,” she clarified. “And the Slayers are religious, so…”

“Very possible,” Ranulf agreed. “That’s an excellent point, _iubita_.”

“Orla is very clever. And somewhat political,” Svet told Barlow shrewdly. “She reads it on Tumblr. Ideas I didn’t learn until I read my daughter-in-law’s sociology textbook from college. It’s very impressive.” _Is that a problem for you?_ her manner seemed to ask.

Maybe this was a good time to bring it up. “I have to be sort of political,” Orla pointed out. “I mean, I’m a young woman in the STEM fields, and I’m… _not-white_ , in some way, and I’m” –

“They say that politics at a meal are bad for the digestion,” said Barlow quickly. Orla tried to think of another topic, but she was still recovering from the precipice she’d been pulled from, and her mind was blank. So, it appeared, were her parents.’ The awkward silence resumed.

* * *

 Orla rang the Johnsons’ doorbell, and tried not to feel guilty.

She should have visited Tim regularly from the start of his illness. They’d never exactly been friends, because Orla hung out with few people at Derry High and all of them were girls – well, except Crys – but Tim had come to drawing club sometimes, and sat near them. Why had he stopped? _His dad wanted him to put more time into sports and the coach authorized extra workouts._

One time, he’d wanted to borrow some nail polish from her. “Robin’s-egg blue.” Orla had kept an eye peeled after that, in case he wore it. He never did. About a month later, the nail polish bottle turned back up in the McAshtons’ mailbox.

_I should have told him to go talk to Angela._

_I should have known_. And then she thought, _why? Because I’m The Trans One ™? Besides, boys can wear makeup, too. Maybe he’s just gay. Or gender-nonconforming and straight, even._

She smiled as nicely as she could as the tired-looking woman, probably Tim’s mother, opened the door. The woman didn’t smile back.

“Hi,” Orla said, trying to sound chipper. “I’m Orla McAshton, I know Tim from school, and, uh” –

“I know who you are,” Tim’s mother said.

“Oh, okay.” Orla tried not to feel the strangeness of the response. “Um, well, my family had a big roast the other night and there was a ton of beef we didn’t eat, so my mom ground it all up, and anyway – she thought you might like some dinner?” She held out the foil-covered pan. “It’s, um, a shepherd’s pie? Well, not technically, since it’s beef and not lamb, but” –

“Thank you,” said Mrs. Johnson shortly, hesitating a moment and then taking the pan. “I’ll try to send the pan back as soon as I can.”

“Sure, no problem – hey, how is Tim? Can I” –

“Tim is sleeping,” she said, starting to close the door to Orla.

“Oh, um.” Orla took the hint and stepped back onto the stoop. She had no choice, really. “Okay, well, I hope he gets better, and we’re here if you need anything…”

“Thank you,” Tim’s mother repeated, and closed the door. Orla stood for a minute, feeling mildly shocked and rebuffed, before she turned and went back down the Johnsons’ brick walk to their driveway. _They’re just stressed because their kid is sick_ , she told herself.

She hadn’t noticed before, being too wrapped up in her own inner monologue, but there was a car in the driveway. It wasn’t either of Tim’s parents’; the garage door was up, and there were already two cars parked inside. It might be Tim’s car, but Orla doubted it. The car looked too new and presentable to be a teenager’s first car; it was black and shiny and didn’t even look secondhand. It also had no bumperstickers, for school sports or anything else; no personalization other than one of those little silver “Jesus” fish that looked like two intersecting parentheses turned on their sides. Orla frowned briefly; like most other people she’d ever met, including her fellow local Christians, she always found those decals slightly obnoxious.

 _So that’s why she wanted to get rid of me; they had a guest over_ , Orla supposed, and turned toward home. She wondered who it was; new people in the area were very rare, and usually news traveled quickly that strangers had come.

* * *

 Freddy found Angela Baker in her usual spot, fishing from her boat out in the cove near the motel and circle of cottages where she rented. It was far away from the towns. Angela Baker mostly lived alone, from what Freddy could tell, aside from Bob Gray and, at one point, Annie (whatever had happened with that). She preferred it that way, apparently. He could understand that, at least.

Bob was with her now, perched on a rock near where Baker’s dingy was moored. Baker sat on a log, doing something with a lobster trap; fixing it maybe. She was wearing shorts, and he could see her leg hair was growing long. _Isn’t she supposed to shave that? Next thing you know she’s gonna be walking around with a beard, like she’s from a fucking circus._

Bob saw him walking down the sandy, seagrass-covered hill first, and pursed his lips slightly. Freddy rolled his eyes.

“Hey, Baker,” he called down to her.

Angela looked over her shoulder, and Freddy saw her grimace and roll her eyes. _“What?”_

“That’s not nice,” Freddy taunted, slipping down the dune. “What if I was gonna buy a lobster?”

“You can’t afford one.”

“Well, we don’t all suck dick in alleys to make ends meet”-

“That is yet another thing I don’t do.” Baker sighed. “Can you at least try to make this stuff relevant to my actual life, Krueger?”

Freddy shrugged. “Fine. You’ve got a dick, blah blah blah…”

“Again, no, I actually don’t anymore. By that logic, you’ve got an umbilical cord,” Baker drawled.

“Speaking of dicks,” Freddy cut her off. “Care to explain to me why my kid wants one now?”

That made Baker look up from her lobster trap. _“What?”_

“What’ve you been telling Crys about this transsexual stuff?”

“What do you mean? Nothing.” Baker raised an eyebrow. “I’ve never talked to her about that shit. At least, not that I can recall.”

“Well, you talked to Orla,” Freddy said, resting his hands on his hips.

“Because Ranulf and Svet came to me after Orla started correcting them,” Baker said impatiently. “I was the only one they knew who knew anything about it – even Arianrod didn’t back then – but I was the only one, except Dwight, and”-

“And you know he and Ranulf don’t get along, Freddy,” Bob added helpfully. “Angie, I’m sure you didn’t tell Crys or anyone else anything inappropriate. Freddy’s just concerned for his daughter.”

“I’m not ‘concerned.’ I’m not _scared,”_ Freddy snapped.

“Fred, you know that’s not what I meant”-

“Just stop telling my kid about your weird tranny crap,” Freddy snarled at her. “She’s saying she might not be a girl now.”

Baker folded her arms. “Maybe she’s not, then.”

“She was before!”

“As far as you knew. Besides, it takes a while to figure this stuff out. And none of that is my fault,” Baker retorted.

Freddy should have known she’d be expecting him to come at her, in retrospect. Bob was already holding him back, but Baker’s eyes were wild and her tanned cheeks were even more flushed than usual. “Let go of him, Bob, I want to settle this shit on my own!”

When he did get to charge her, she jabbed him in the groin with one of her bigger rods, and then pinned him on the sand, wailing on him until Freddy’s Underwood instinct kicked in and he curled up, bracing himself against the blows. After all, she was still “conventionally alive” (somehow), so if he cut her, Bob would get pissed.

Finally, Baker straightened up, her back popping. “Krueger, do you have some kind of shemale fetish or something? Do you want to fuck me?”

Regaining his balance as he was, Freddy felt his mouth drop open slowly. _“What?”_

Baker shrugged easily, her arms and shoulders looking as loose even after the brawling, as if the breeze was blowing them. “Whenever you’re around, you never shut up about my body and my gender.”

“I bullshit everyone,” Freddy’s mouth pointed out.

“Yeah, but with me, you know, you come off looking obsessed with it. So, what’s the deal? Have you got some kind of fetish, or…?” she trailed off slowly, and Freddy saw a malicious look cross her face.

“What?” he repeated.

“Oh man, it makes _too much_ sense,” Baker said with a snigger that Freddy himself would have been proud of. “Now that I think about it. Because I remember when I was a lot younger, before my sister died, and it used to be I hated stuff like dresses, and the color pink – I still have a hard time with some of that, but you know – and even later I used to get so annoyed at the ‘girly-girls’…” she shook her head. “You’re one of us, aren’t you, Krueger? _You’re_ a little bit of a ‘tranny,’ deep down, aren’t you?”

Freddy’s glove snapped out, and he could already feel it sinking into Baker’s somehow-still-traditionally-alive chest, right between her two fucking implants, when he felt his arm suddenly stop. He could vaguely recall something from school called _kinetic energy_ , and his arm felt like it had suddenly lost all its _kinetic energy_ in less than one second. Reality changed so fast it took his brain a few seconds to catch up, and on Baker’s face he could see the same confusion; she hadn’t even had time to be terrified, let alone respond.

Bob was gripping Freddy’s glove hand calmly in one of his. “That’s enough,” he said evenly. “This conversation’s not going anywhere helpful.”

“Stay away from my kid,” said Freddy’s mouth, trying not to vomit as the two humans readjusted themselves to reality as it existed now.

“I’ll stay away from _Annie’s kid_ whenever Annie tells me to,” Baker snapped. “Since she’s the one who does the actual parenting.”

“I’m literally a fucking child murderer” –

 _“So is she, you fucking entitled man-child, but she handles it!”_ And Bob was holding them both apart again.

“Get out of here, Freddy,” he said, in a low tone that sounded like he also was a few seconds from losing his shit.

Freddy passed Orla McAshton on his way back up the hill to the dirt road. He didn’t look at her. The last thing he needed was Ranulf McAshton on the warpath thinking Freddy had looked at his daughter funny. It had been twenty years, and the pompous old asshole still couldn’t let one damn night’s attempt at dreamstalking go.

* * *

Orla knew there had been fighting; she’d heard raised voices, and felt a stutter in reality that probably meant Bob Gray had had to go in and adjust something. She hoped no one had been hurt too badly; Bob didn’t mess with memories so much anymore unless he had to, so the person probably still remembered what had happened. And it had probably been Angela Baker who’d suffered it.

“Hey, Angie,” she said with a tentative smile as she drew up to the shore. Angela definitely looked guarded and shaken; Orla felt bad about troubling her, but she was here, and it probably did qualify as important. “Hey, Bob.”

“Hello, Orla,” Bob said with a little smile. Angela cleared her throat, reaching in the pocket of her cargo shorts for a flask. Orla waited patiently for her to finish drinking.

Finally, Angela said, “Hi, Orla.”

“I’m sorry to bug you…”

Angela waved this away. “I’m okay. What’s up?”

“There’s…I know something about Tim Johnson.” Orla felt like someone was about to yell at her. “I should have said it sooner, but I didn’t…I didn’t know what I saw, I think, and then I felt guilty for not seeing it sooner, for a while, and I don’t know how to tell Annie…”

“What is it, Orla?” Angela said more quietly.

“Someone else is at their house. They’ve got a new black car; it didn’t look familiar. Maybe treating him along with Annie? I don’t know if she knows, and if she needs to know,” Orla explained.

“Well that’s no trouble, I can just tell her as soon as” – Bob began, but Angela held up a hand to silence him.

“Is there something else?” she asked.

“Yeah.” Orla tried to assemble her thoughts. “It’s like…when Tim was little, he used to play with Crys and me and some other girls in Derry. Until his Dad made him hang out with boys instead. He used to come to drawing club with us until he had to put more time into basketball. And…he asked me if he could borrow nail polish once…” the words kept tumbling out, even as she realized how fragmented it all sounded. _What are you even trying to say?_ “I should have gone to visit him more when he got sick…”

Angela was nodding slowly. “So his parents want him to be more…”

“More manly, I guess.”

“That might not be nothing.” Angela rubbed the back of her neck. “I wish I knew how this all fits together. I don’t even know what’s supposed to be wrong with him.”

“I haven’t seen it before,” Bob agreed. “But it seems like there should be some connection. His parents keep him in the house all the time, under their watch, now someone else is with them…”

“The car had a Jesus fish on its bumper,” Orla recalled. “One of those silver magnet things…”

“Yeah,” Angela murmured. “Fuck.”

Something cold dropped into the pit of Orla’s belly. “You don’t think it’s like…conversion therapy?”

“I don’t know.” Angela rubbed her face and forehead. “Fuck, I don’t know…”

Bob frowned. “What’s conversion therapy?”

“Trying to brainwash kids into being straight,” Angela said, face still in her hands.

“It causes trauma,” Orla told him. “I think it’s usually illegal now.”

“I’ll talk to Annie,” Angela said, sitting up and reaching for her flask again. At least her sip was shorter this time. “She should know enough that she can question the Johnsons about this. She needs to know what other professionals are working on her patient. I think.”

Orla turned toward home, wishing she knew what else to tell Angela; preferably any good news. She had nothing. She felt helpless, and still guilty that she’d said nothing for so long.

* * *

 “You’ll talk to Annie?” Bob’s forehead creased. “Sorry, it’s just…how long has it been? You know me, I always lose track…”

“Five years,” Angela heard herself croak, still recovering from the stabbing. “Yeah, I will. If she doesn’t already know.”

“She wouldn’t allow anything like that conversion stuff to go on with a patient of hers” –

“She’s Annie,” said Angela shortly. “And they’re his parents. It’s their choice.”

Bob frowned. “I don’t think you’re right. Annie wouldn’t allow that.”

“Why wouldn’t she?”

“She’s learned. And she’s still learning. You know that.”

“I don’t know what I know about her.”

Bob gave her a long look. “You’re not obligated to forgive anyone,” he said finally. “But you know that’s not her situation. That isn’t something she would support. Not anymore.”

Angela decided not to argue with him.

 

* * *

 

Angela’s standard response to situations like this, these days, was numbness aided by her flask. After all, if Fred Krueger was allowed to use booze to resist the urge to go on a murderous rampage, she should be too.

 _Of course, Fred Krueger is already dead and doesn’t have to worry about liver disease_. Angela brushed that thought off, though; you had to die of something, after all.

There was always a measure of guilt that came along with anything involving Annie Wilkes, these days, in addition to the hurt, anger, and residual dysphoria-mixed-with-shame. _Why can’t you forgive her? You know she’s sorry_ , said Angela’s conscience, which often sounded like Bob Gray’s voice. _You know she took it to heart, and you know she misses you._

 _But I’m not ready_ , Angela thought, parking the rusted old pickup truck on the street beside Annie’s sandy, crabgrass-filled lawn.

Besides, admitting that a queerphobe like Annie Wilkes could be different, could change and get better, would oblige Angela to start giving more of them a chance, wouldn’t it? And that wasn’t going to happen. That was just survival. It was probably the wrong way to see it, overly black-and-white, but Angela felt suddenly too worn out to wrestle with her own skewed, mildly delusional views on the world right now.

She hated how cute the little house was, with its attempt at growing strawberry plants under the front window, and its little straw wreath with fake primroses and plastic ladybugs woven in, hanging on the front door behind the outer screen.

Angela steeled herself, but Crys was the one who answered, looking engaged and peaceful and lighthearted, always a balm to Angela’s nerves as much as little Orla was. Her hair was pulled back, as it usually was these days; had Annie nixed the idea of a pixie haircut, or had Crys just not asked yet?

“Hey, Crys,” she heard herself say. “Is your mom home?”

Crys’ brow knit. “Uh…yeah.” She sounded guarded.

“Is it a bad time?”

“I don’t know. I can ask.” Crys let her in, and Angela stood in the front hall, just slightly too short to knock her head into the fake-crystal light fixture, feeling profoundly out-of-place. _“Mom!”_ she heard the genderqueer yell up the stairs.

Annie didn’t look older than she had the last time Angela had looked into her face for an extended period of time. In fact, it looked like she was appearing in a form a few years younger now, early thirties instead of the forty-odd way she’d looked at her death. She’d lost weight, too, and that wasn’t any kind of undead glamor, because if there was one thing Annie didn’t believe in doing, it was letting herself off easy. _Most times, at least_. She’d most likely been actually going through with the low-calorie yogurt cups and binge-eating disorder treatment.

She looked like she’d just gotten home from the clinic with Hannibal, or from the Johnsons,’ although that timeline probably didn’t work out. But she looked tired, wearing some kind of lavender sweater, patterned blouse, and skirt ensemble that tried to match without really matching. A cross was tucked under the blouse’s collar, but it looked pearly, not like her old plain brass pendant. Her bangs were still tightly pinned back.

Her face did something complicated and heartbreaking when she saw Angela. “Hello, Angie,” she said warmly. “Did Crys ask you if you wanted anything to drink? I can make some tea.”

“No thanks.” Angela almost felt guilty about how short her voice sounded. “Did you know the Johnsons are seeing someone else to treat Tim? In addition to you?”

Annie’s brow furrowed briefly, confused at the abrupt shift in tone. “I think so. It’s not as if that’s unusual, getting a second opinion with a case that’s so” –

“He’s not a doctor,” Angela cut her off. “Or any other kind of health care professional. Is he? He’s just some Jesus freak.”

Annie paused, and Angela saw her biting the inside of her cheek. “Yes, I know about him. No, he’s not a medical professional. And he’s not a Jesus freak.”

“So if he has no medical training, why is he treating your patient?”

“He’s not ‘treating’ Tim. Not in a medical way. He’s not doing anything _dangerous_ ,” Annie said, but was she going a little red? Embarrassed? Why was that, Angela wondered. “I’m not having him set up IVs or anything like that.”

“So what _is_ he doing?”

Annie looked like she’d just been slapped. Then, she regrouped. “Well, I certainly don’t have to tell _you_ that. The patient has confidentiality.”

“Conversion therapy?” Angela shot back, and now Annie’s eyes went wide. A gasp from up the stairs let them know that Crys had heard it, too.

“ _No_ ,” Annie snapped, and this time Angela could tell it was righteous fury in her face and voice. “I know that doesn’t work, I know it causes trauma – how dare you assume I don’t at least know enough about my job to know how damaging that is” – she trailed off, confusion overtaking her. “Why would I even prescribe it in the first place? Tim isn’t…I mean, I never saw any indication…”

“Orla has some suspicions,” Angela explained shortly. “I guess he borrowed nail polish from her once.”

“There was some other stuff, too,” Crys’ voice said from upstairs. “It’s hard to explain, though. It’s a vibe, you know?”

Annie rallied. “Well, I have no desire to…to ‘cure’ anything like that. And I know that things like conversion therapy and applied behavior analysis are traumatic. So I’d never let that go on, and I’ve been watching. Albion – Pastor Freeman – hasn’t been there without me.”

“First name basis, huh?” Angela asked, aware of how nasty she sounded. “Well, he was there today. Orla thinks she saw his car. She was bringing the family a casserole or something from her mother.” She gave Annie a triumphant smirk. “Black and shiny and new-looking, right? With one of those Jesus fish decals?”

Annie was quiet now, so Angela decided to press. “What’s he supposed to be doing, Annie?”

Annie leaned against the banister, looking even more exhausted. “Tim’s condition doesn’t seem to have any physical causes,” she explained at last. “We – I’ve had Hannibal look over my notes, too – we think it’s psychological and psychosomatic – it has a powerful degenerative effect on his body. Tim…he seems to believe he’s possessed by a demon.”

Angela stared.

“Although it’s possible, I guess, we still think it’s a delusion at this point,” Annie continued. “But Pastor Freeman thought he might be able to provide kind of a placebo effect. He thought if he prayed over the boy and did some…well, some exorcism-like stuff, that it might help Tim. And I thought it might be a good idea.” She shrugged bitterly. “But no, I guess I don’t know what else he’s doing there. Tim’s parents must have asked him to come.”

Angela looked up at her, trying to judge whether Annie was worried about her patient, or whether her ego was just bruised, and how she, Angela, felt about the woman. It would be so much easier to hate her, but it was still too hard, and it eluded her.

“I just thought you should know,” she said at last, pulling the door back open and stepping out into the blue winter dusk. “Take care, Annie,” she added over her shoulder, without knowing if she meant it.

 


End file.
